


Five Years Between

by Ewrite



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Ava Sharpe POV, Crossing Timelines, F/F, Fake/Pretend Relationship, First Kiss, Humor, Legends of Tomorrow - Freeform, Romance, Sara Lance/Ava Sharpe-centric, altering memories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-08
Updated: 2020-04-17
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:02:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 24,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23545093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ewrite/pseuds/Ewrite
Summary: Ava Sharpe and Sara Lance need to find the anachronism so they can get back to their very separate lives. They're in the hotel room where Gideon reported the activity, ready to begin investigating. Meanwhile, five years in the future, Ava and Sara are celebrating their five year anniversary in the very room where they first got together. But the next morning finds that the memories of both versions of Sara and Ava do not match their realities. Can either pairing figure out what is happening while hiding or faking their true feelings?ORIn which there are two versions of Ava and Sara from five years apart but they’ve switched memories.Side note: I’m new to the fandom so please be kind. Enjoy!
Relationships: Sara Lance & Ava Sharpe, Sara Lance/Ava Sharpe
Comments: 61
Kudos: 161





	1. Waking Up

Ava Sharpe shivers. She moves to pull the blanket over her shoulder but it doesn’t come. Groaning, she shifts her foot to free the blanket and tugs again. It’s stuck.

Hmm. Ava opens her eyes and half-sits in the bed, turning to determine what’s holding the blanket in place. She gasps when she sees Sara Lance, body tucked along Ava’s back, fast asleep. Almost snoring while wearing no shirt. Just like Ava.

Shit. Ava lays back down. They hadn’t slept together. Of course not. Ava doesn’t think of Captain Lance like that, and she knows Lance would never-

But clearly they had.

Ava thinks back to the previous night. No booze. No dancing. Nothing that might precipitate anything in the bedroom. She closes her eyes as she remembers entering the bland hotel room, sizing up the two beds and choosing the one near the window. She’d thought, at the time, that Captain Lance might protest and want the view, but Lance had shrugged without comment. Ava opens her eyes and looks straight ahead, noting that they aren’t near the window. Does that mean Ava got up in the night to join Captain Lance?

No.

But she must have. Maybe a draft snuck into the room from that old window. Ava knows that if she’d been cold, though, she’d still be wearing her dark t-shirt and shorts. Maybe she got warm after she switched beds.

Ava doesn’t remember any of this so she knows it didn’t happen.

She closes her eyes again and begins moving her right hand from her stomach. She shifts it down her side to scratch an itch near her hip. Right below her bone, where her underwear should be.

“Ah!” Ava turns quickly and -thud- falls from the bed. She rolls over as she hears Captain Lance stirring above her, realizing that the blanket is still on the bed. Ava rolls towards the bed, trying to shuffle her body beneath it to block Lance’s view. There’s no room.

“Ava!” The name feels too familiar, too intimate. Clearly Lance agrees. “Sharpe, what are you doing?”

Ava turns her head up, catching sight of Lance’s hair peeking over the side of the bed. Captain Lance must have seen her. All of her.

“Nothing!” Ava shuffles against the underside of the bed fruitlessly until she feels something soft land on her back. She balls the sheet up as she pulls it onto herself. Slowly Ava turns back to untangle the sheet and make it into a more fitting cover. “I didn’t do anything,” she says.

“Then what are you doing down there, like that?” Captain Lance doesn’t sound pissed off, playful, or sarcastic, the main moods that Ava associates with the reformed assassin.

“I don’t know! I just woke up and you were, and I was-” Ava gestures down to her body but realizes that Lance isn’t looking. “We weren’t like we’d been last night.”

“That’s true enough.” Ava hears Lance shifting on the bed again. “Are you set?”

For a second Ava doesn’t know what Lance means. “Oh, yes.” She pulls the sheet around herself a bit tighter, tucking it under her feet. She watches as Lance stands, the blanket around her own body. “I don’t think we-”

Lance cuts her off. “That’s not what I was wearing last night.”

Ava follows Lance’s gaze to a pile of rumpled clothing on the floor. Ava shifts to her knees and scootches over, making sure the sheet stays in place. She picks up the garment. It’s a blue dress, but Ava knows they’d both been wearing casual clothing the night before. Not like sex-with-a-coworker-in-complete-disregard-of-the-rules casual, but undercover mission casual. Normal. Underneath the blue dress is another, in red. Ava picks up that one too.

“I don’t recognize either of those,” says Lance.

“I do.” Ava throws the red one towards the Captain. “I’ve had the blue one for a couple of months.”

Lance catches the red dress without looking as she turns to the rest of the room. On a chair is a suitcase. “I’m going to wear something else.” She moves to the bag and lifts the top, which is already unzipped, then blinks at the contents for a moment. “Is this yours?”

Ava watches Lance lift a shirt from the suitcase. It’s white, a button-up, clearly in Ava’s style. Ava moves to stand. “That’s my suitcase then,” she says. But she brought a black case. She doesn’t own a grey one.

“No, it’s not.” Lance lifts a small travel case from the bag. “This is mine. And so is the suitcase.”

Ava walks over to stand next to Lance, looking down. The case is a mess of their shared belongings. One lint roller, Ava’s shirts snug against Lance’s pants. All their belongings jumbled together like they belong there. Ava grabs one of the shirts then shifts the items around until she builds an outfit. “I need a shower,” she says.

In the bathroom there is a bucket with ice on the counter. The empty bottle is in the trash. Champagne, kind of expensive. She kicks the trashcan and shifts to the counter, dumping her clothing down. Next to the bucket is a card that’s obviously been opened before. Hotel stationary.

Happy Anniversary!  
Your friends at the City Escape Hotel

Ava closes the card and puts it back. She turns the water on, puts down her clothing, and steps into the spray. Ava has her head tilted back and her eyes closed when the door opens.

“Agent Sharpe.” Lance’s voice is firm.

“Can’t I have a second?” Ava turns away from the opaque curtain.

“I have a cut,” says Lance.

“What?” Ava sticks her head under the water to rinse away the last of the shampoo and turns off the water. The drips echo as they slow. Ava pushes the door open and takes the towel that Lance passes her.

“Well, not a cut. A scar. A huge scar, one I don’t remember getting.”

Ava wraps the towel around herself and steps from the shower, not bothering to dry herself first. “So you don’t have a cut?”

“Look?” Lance is dressed in a loose t-shirt and sweatpants. She pulls her shirt to show Ava a scar running along her shoulder. It’s straight and would have been from a deep wound, maybe a knife or a skimming bullet. The tissue is white, raised. Completely healed, probably for a couple of years at least.

“What?” Ava raises a finger to touch the scar. She leaves a trail of water droplets along the line.

“I’ve never been hurt there,” says Lance. She pulls her shirt back into place, pushing Ava’s hand from her skin. “There shouldn’t be a scar.”

“So we’re in the future?” Ava shakes her head before looking Lance in the face. “In our own future bodies?”

“Or we’re in an alternative timeline. Another universe.”

Ava steps to the counter and opens the card. She reads the words again before handing it to Lance. “One where we’re in love.”

Five Years Earlier:

Ava Sharpe shivers. She pulls the blanket over her shoulder and sighs when it moves easily. For once Sara mustn’t be laying on it. Ava turns around to reach for Sara, wondering why her back is so cold, when her arm hits the empty bed. She pulls her hand to her chest and opens her eyes. Sara isn’t there. Ava sits up in the bed, pulling the blanket with her. Sara must be in the bathroom, she thinks. Ava rolls over and sighs when she spots Sara sleeping on the other bed, facing the wall.

Ava lays back and exhales. She reaches under her shorts to itch her hip, but pauses. She is dressed. Did she get cold in the night? Ava rolls over and looks at the window, all chipped paint and old charm. Maybe. But last night Ava had been in the further bed, with Sara to keep warm. If she’d gotten cold enough to get dressed why is she closer to the window? Branches outside dance in the breeze, their leaves bright green in the morning sun.

Surely Sara has slept enough.

Ava gets up and walks over to Sara’s bed, watching her love breathe deep. Ava cups Sara’s jaw with her hand as she lifts the blanket to slide into the bed. She relaxes as Sara reaches out before Ava is able to lay down.

“Good morning sleepy head,” whispers Ava.

Sara smiles before opening her eyes. She blinks once, twice, then takes Ava’s hand as Ava tucks herself into the bed. Sara chuckles. “When did you get another one of those?”

Ava smiles back. “Another one of what?”

“Your shirt.” Sara pulls at the garment, bringing Ava a bit closer.

Ava doesn’t respond as she looks down, wondering what shirt she pulled on in the night. Ava shifts back and sits up as she recognizes it. It’s dark blue and isn’t something she packed. She couldn’t have brought it along, in fact. The shirt has a stupid phrase that Gary made to commemorate a mission in which the two of them had spent sixteen hours surveilling an anachronism that depended on being unobserved to cause damage. The printed words on the shirt hadn’t made Ava smile when she first read them, which was why it had been relegated to sleepwear. A 16 Hour Friendship, in bold red font. The shirt ripped about a year back. “I didn’t.”

“Clearly you did,” says Sara. She tugs at the shirt, trying to pull Ava closer.

“You’re dressed too,” says Ava.

Sara’s hands stop. She squints as she watches Ava. “Yeah, sometimes I sleep in a t-shirt and sweats, you know that.”

“But not last night,” says Ava. “Last night we weren’t dressed when we fell asleep.”

Sara meets Ava’s eyes for a moment as though remembering their touches and their entwined bodies. They both turn slowly to take in the room. Ava notices that their grey suitcase isn’t on the chair by the window. The chair by the window isn’t near the window at all, but is pulled into the desk under a painting of a lily. Ava’s blazer is draped over its back. The work blazer that Ava hasn’t brought with them.

“What the hell is going on?”

“That’s my suitcase,” says Ava. She leaves the bed and walks towards the bureau. Her black bag is on the floor. She flips it open and looks inside but it’s bare. Without pause Ava opens the top drawer. Inside are her clothes, folded neatly and precisely.

“You didn’t bring your suitcase,” says Sara.

“I didn’t bring my blazer either,” says Ava. She gestures to the chair while picking through her clothes. “I didn’t bring any of these clothes.”

“Then what, someone decided to swap out our wardrobe?” Sara stands and walks to the grey suitcase at the end of her bed. She drops to her knees and opens it. Ava turns to watch her sift through the folded items.

“This is what I pack for a mission,” says Ava.

“Same,” says Sara. She pulls out her long-sleeved White Canary outfit.

“We should be ready.” Ava pulls clothing from her suitcase and begins to change. She dons a white dress shirt, top button undone, with slacks that match her blazer. She picks up the blazer before noticing Sara watching her. “Sara, if something wants us to be prepared-”

“We ought not to disappoint,” says Sara. She picks up the White Canary outfit, then pauses. “Do you think we should be stealth about it?”

Ava shrugs. “Probably.” She drapes the blazer back over the chair and watches Sara dig through the suitcase again, coming up with a shirt and jeans. Sara pulls off her t-shirt and Ava gasps. “Wait.”

“What?”

Ava steps to Sara and puts a hand on her right shoulder. She feels the muscle underneath, strong and unbroken.

“Your scar is gone.”

Sara laughs. “No it’s not.” She looks down and the smile drops from her face. “No, that can’t be right.”

“How can your scar be gone?”

“Did we go through time?” Sara looks at Ava’s wrist. Ava doesn’t have to look to know that her Time Courier isn’t there.

“I-I don’t know.” Ava steps away from Sara for a moment. She turns a half-circle. “We could have. Or we could be in another universe. Or maybe some magical creature is making us imagine this.”

“Can I contact-” Sara raises a finger to her ear. “I don’t have my comms.”

“Me neither. Shocking.” Ava turns to face Sara again. She begins opening the drawers of her belongings. “Do you have any future tech?”

Sara kneels to dig in her bag again. After a moment they both come up empty. “No. I guess we’ll have to figure this the old fashioned way.”

Ava glances over with a curious expression.

Sara looks concerned. “On our own.”


	2. Staying In and Heading Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ava and Sara from the past need a plan before breakfast. Well, Ava does. Sara clearly thinks plans are overrated. Typical.
> 
> Ava and Sara from the future just need some breakfast. Although Ava would like a plan as well, before they truly embarrass themselves.

The note on the nightstand says that breakfast is complimentary.

“We should go,” says Lance. She is showered and dressed, and Ava notices the tear in her jeans. Ava shakes her head as she paces the room.

“We can’t go. Not without a plan and some knowledge about what kind of world we’ll be walking into.”

“Can’t go?” Lance laughs. “Have you seen me without breakfast? It’s the most important meal of the day for a reason, Sharpe.”

Ava sighs and stops pacing. “There are rules, Captain Lance, and despite your constant need to fly in the face of them-”

“Of course there are rules!” Lance braces a fist against her forehead. “But how exactly do you propose we find out about the time or place we’re in without leaving this room?”

“I didn’t say we shouldn’t leave,” says Ava. She steps to the shared suitcase. “But we need a plan. If the people here have met the version of us that was here last night, they’ll expect to see a happy couple, not, you know, us.”

Lance gives off a sort of growling laugh. “Happy couple, right. This must be an alternate universe then ‘cause at no point in our lives will that happen.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Ava says. “The point is we need to act like this version of us. To think and behave like them in case anyone here knows us. Them. We need to have a plan!”

“Fine.” Lance sits on the bed closest to the window and sighs, bigger than necessary in Ava’s opinion. “So what’s the plan, Agent Sharpe?”

“We go through their things.” Ava walks over to the bag that they’d pawed through and dumps some of its contents onto the bureau. “We need to know them and why they're here.”

“It’s their anniversary,” says Lance. She rolls her eyes at the word.

“Okay yes, but why this place? Have they been here before, do they have any friends nearby?” She is sorting the items into piles. She almost laughs as she tosses a black thong aside.

“Hmm.” Lance gets up and begins pulling out drawers. The desk, the two nightstands. She grins as she lifts a wallet from the stand next to the bed they woke up in. “Voila!”

Ava doesn’t pause her search. “Good, go through it.” She shifts so she can watch Lance pull out IDs and cards.

“Shit,” says Lance.

“What?” Ava walks over and looks at the photo on the nightstand. Them, in this hotel. A photo that could have been taken in this very room. The pair are kissing, Lance’s arm outstretched to steady the camera or phone that was used to snap the picture.

“Shit,” Ava echoes. She looks at Lance, who is facing her. Ava clears her throat. “Good find. We have to be these saps then. And clearly they’ve been here before.”

“Sharpe,” Lance says. She points to the ID. “It’s your wallet.”

“Give it here then.” Ava holds out her hand and watches as Lance pockets the picture before handing the wallet over. Ava doesn’t have time to wonder why Lance is keeping it. “I’m not done looking through the suitcase.”

“You do that. I’ll check the bathroom and closet.”

Lance walks away, leaving Ava to pocket the wallet and return to her previous sorting. At the end they’ve found nothing more interesting than the Captain’s wallet, which does not contain any photo evidence of their alleged love. They sit down, Lance on the unused bed and Ava on the chair.

“We should practice sounding affectionate,” says Lance.

Ava twists her lips into a grimace, then sighs. “Fine. We’re in love.” Even she can feel the disdain in her words.

“So convincing,” says Lance. “Sharpe we’re in love. Act it.”

“But we’re not.” Ava gives Lance a smirk this time. “And using my last name doesn’t exactly convey undying devotion.”

“Love and undying devotion aren’t the same thing.” Lance reaches across the space between them and grabs Ava’s hand. Ava begins to pull back. “We’re in love,” says Lance. “People in love hold hands.”

Ava sits up a bit straighter which pulls Lance’s hand closer, but she doesn’t tug herself free. “Fine. We’re in love.” This time it feels only awkward, not completely unreasonable.

“Yes we are,” says Lance. She rubs a finger along Ava’s thumb and Ava’s gaze drops to their hands. “We’re in love and we’re affectionate, I’m sure.”

“Even when I’m actually in love I’m not much for PDA,” says Ava. The lie is a hopeful one. Ava wants to pull her hand back but feels like doing so would only prolong this nonsense.

“And how many times have you been in love, Agent Sharpe?”

Ava snorts. “I’m in love now, aren’t I?” She decides to push back on this sass by entwining her fingers with Lance’s. “Better?”

“Much,” says Lance. “We should practice walking together.”

Ava almost laughs. “We’ve walked together.”

“Not while holding hands.” Lance stands and pulls Ava to her feet. “How fast is your pace?”

“Fast enough.” Ava turns and pulls Lance along, keeping their hands together. She is surprised when Lance matches her stride without pause. Their hands swing evenly between them and Ava doesn’t feel too odd about the motion. When she thinks about the person the hand is attached to she comes up short. “Is this crazy?”

“It was your idea,” says Lance. “Fitting in, I mean.”

“But will we really fool anyone? I don’t mean to be-”

“Sharpe, every couple has off days. If our impression isn’t perfect people will think we’re in a fight. But even couples who are off hold hands sometimes.”

Ava nods as they start to walk again, turning back to make another circuit of the room.

“We’d better get going if we want to catch that breakfast,” says Lance. She drops Ava’s hand to pick up the card. “This says it’s only open until 9 and it’s already 8:30.”

“Then let’s go,” says Ava, walking to the door. Before she can get there Lance is at her side, offering her hand.

“Fine,” says Ava. “Let’s get this over with.”

Fire Years Earlier:

Ava shrugs as she enters the hall. “I don’t know,” she says. “I think we’d do better to lay low.” She looks at Sara’s outstretched hand with a sigh..

Sara smirks. “I thought I broke you of that habit.” Her hand lowers to her side as she starts down the hall. “I’m assuming laying low includes not behaving like a couple. 

Ava nods and smiles, but she also sighs again.

“I suppose you’re right, we should keep our heads down until we figure this out. But we can’t figure anything out on an empty stomach.”

In the elevator Ava catches Sara stealing a glance at her reflection. They lock eyes for a second before Sara steps towards Ava to take her hand.

Ding!

The elevator doors slide open as Sara steps back, releasing Ava. Ava shifts towards the back to allow a couple space for themselves and their luggage. Sara catches Ava’s eye as the people turn to face the door. The two women smile at one another. They like the Gemlands.

“Can’t believe we didn’t get our usual rooms,” says Jerry Gemland. Ava remembers him from several of their trips including a memorable night where he and his wife made a friendly wager against Ava and Sara over a game of pool. His hair almost brushes the ceiling and he touches his wife’s elbow so she turns to look at him.

“Ha, relatable,” says Sara. She chuckles and elbows Jerry in that familiar way she has with friends.

Ava is closer to Sharon. She watches the woman eye Sara with a great deal of discomfort. Ava shifts on her feet for a moment as the elevator slowly descends.

“You and your friend are in the wrong room too?” Sharon speaks to Ava.

“My friend?” Ava glances at Sara again, who has her mouth open as she stares at Sharon. “No, we’re not in the wrong room. But-”

“My husband is not interested,” says Sharon. Ava watches Jerry look at his wife with a thankful smile.

Sara shakes her head and looks at the floor. Ava can see the red creeping up her neck. “I’m not interested either,” she mumbles.

The elevator bings before the doors slide open again. Ava steps forward and reaches back for Sara’s wrist, pulling her out even though they are two floors above the lobby. “What the hell was that?” Ava hisses the words as they make their way down the hall, heading for the stairs.

“I don’t know,” Sara said, “but I would never-”

“I know.” Ava stops at the door to the stairs. “This is going to be harder than we thought.” She looks down at her hand on Sara’s wrist and lets go.

“What even was that? Ava, was I giving off-.”

Ava drops her voice to a whisper. “Babe no, I know you wouldn’t-”

Sara cuts Ava off with a heavy exhale. “Okay. This is, this is impossible. But we got this. We’re together, and we can figure this out.”

Ava nods her head and gives a faint smile. “At least nothing’s trying to kill us.”

Sara smiles back. “Not yet.” She reaches over and squeezes Ava’s hand. “Let’s go.”

The dining area is just beyond the lobby. As they head over Ava waves to the hostess, a tall woman that she remembers Sara flirting with the first time they were here. Tiffany. Waving is fine, she reasons. A simple way to get someone’s attention without seeming too familiar. Tiffany doesn’t wave back, instead giving Ava a generic smile before turning to help other guests.

Huh, Ava thinks to herself. She grabs a plate and begins picking out cut fruit for Sara before she stops. “Coworkers,” she mumbles as she hands the plate over and grabs one for herself.

“Right.” Sara walks over to start on the other side of the buffet. Ava watches her walk away with a sigh.

“Hello!” Sara’s voice rings out when Ava is waiting for her toast to, well, toast. She turns to watch Sara smile at a middle-aged man in a grey vest who looks at Sara without recognition. He mumbles something Ava can’t hear then walks away. Ava raises her eyebrows at Sara, who shrugs. Mr. Barnes is always one to hold a long conversation with either Sara or Ava, and has been that way since their second visit to this hotel.

“That was weird, right?” Sara sits across from Ava with her oatmeal and the fruit that Ava had started to put on her plate. She takes her first bite and shifts uncomfortably.

“Yes,” says Ava, looking at the table as she talks. “The folks in the lobby didn’t acknowledge us either. Last night they were so friendly.”

“And the hostess,” says Sara.

Ava nods while picking up her yogurt. “Do they not know us or are they ignoring us?”

Sara shakes her head. “Jerry and Sharon didn’t just ignore us, but I don’t know. We need recon.”

“Agreed Sar- Lance.” Ava has to think about Sara as Lance. If she changes the way they talk when they’re alone they will be less likely to slip up in front of others. “I’m thinking we walk around and see who still knows us. But we don’t interact with our friends unless they initiate with us first.”

“We can hit all our usual haunts. The bookstore. The park. If Flora’s here we’ll know for sure we’re in the past.”

Ava tilts her head. “Flora could exist here, in our time, in an alternate universe. We need concrete proof one way or the other.”

“You’re right,” Sara says. She is almost done with her breakfast as Ava begins on her toast. “What would you take as solid evidence?”

“I don’t know, a newspaper? Something with a date? But even then we could be in a different universe at the same point on their timeline. It’s a tough thing to determine.”

“Okay, so I say we stick with seeing what else is different. Or, rather, who else is different. If there are any dangers here they’ll be people, not dates.”

“Agreed,” says Ava. “Do you think this is an anachronism or a magical creature?”

Sara hums for a moment. “Could be either. I don’t think it’s the work of an Encore, and it doesn’t seem malicious enough for a demon.”

“Hmm.” Ava swallows her last bit of toast and stands up. “Ready?”

“When you are,” says Sara. She tilts her spoon towards Ava as she stands too. “You know I’d follow you anywhere, Director Sharpe.”

Ava snorts. “Real professional, Lance.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the kind comments and kudos on chapter 1. I am glad you seem engaged and interested! :-)
> 
> I've decided I'll be giving general thanks in the notes on each chapter, rather than on specific comments. My wife might kill me if I spend too much time on this site, lol. I will address any questions as replies to individual comments though.
> 
> Anyway thanks again. I hope you stick around!


	3. Abnormal Party Sneaks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Past Ava and Sara enjoy a latish breakfast. Ava is uncomfortable with the attentions of others, including those given by Lance.
> 
> Future Ava and Sara go book shopping! Ok it's actually a ruse to try out an idea Sara has, specifications provided by Ava.

“Sara! Ava!”

Ava spins around and senses that Lance has done the same. “Yes?”

“How was your night?” The receptionist is gesturing for them to come over to the counter. As they arrive she looks at her watch and raises her eyebrows. “I see you slept in.”

“Yeah,” says Lance. She slings her arm around Ava’s waist, who almost shifts away before realizing that she should smile. She looks over her shoulder and sees that there is a man waiting to talk to the receptionist, but the woman doesn’t seem bothered.

“Well you ladies had better hurry if you’re going to eat.”

“Sure, Jen.” Ava looks at Lance with surprise before noticing the woman’s name tag. Jennifer.

The woman laughs. “I hope you have a nice day planned. Happy Anniversary!” Jen smiles before waving them off.

Lance pulls Ava around by her waist and starts walking towards the dining area. Ava matches her stride briefly before sidestepping so Lance will let go. “Do we have to be that affectionate?” Ava whispers.

“Did you see her?” Lance runs a hand through her hair. “She clearly had an idea of how we behave.”

And how we feel, Ava thinks. She puffs air out her lips and steps closer to Lance as they reach the buffet area. She is at the plates first and picks one up before glancing at Lance and handing a plate to her.

Lance rolls her eyes at Ava before calling out, in a relatively normal voice, “Thanks babe.”

Ava looks down at her plate. “You’re welcome, hon.”

“Sara!” A man, startlingly tall with dark hair and dancing eyes, steps up to drop a hand on Lance’s arm. Ava can’t help but stiffen as she watches Lance straighten her shoulders.

“Hello!” says Lance. She’s meeting the man’s enthusiastic smile with one of her own, and Ava thinks for a moment that it would be nice to receive such a smile from Lance. “How are you?”

“I should be asking you,” the man says. “And Ava.” He lets go of Lance to pull Ava into a half-hug, only made less awkward because of Ava’s height.

“Sharon!” The man calls over Ava’s shoulder as he pulls back, giving Ava that same smile.

“Jerry, what are you- Oh Ava!” Sharon’s smile is as wide as Jerry’s. She has one hand on her stomach as she reaches the two women and the tall man. “Sara! How are you lovely ladies?” She leans forward to kiss Ava’s cheek, then turns to Lance and does the same. Ava catches the Captain’s eye and wonders that no one is clocking the shocked edge to Lance’s features. Ava looks down as she realizes that she must look the same.

“We’re good.” Ava clears her throat and takes a step closer to Lance. Any port in a confusing storm of excitable strangers.

“Can you believe it’s been five years?” Sharon raises a hand to her mouth in mock shock. “You must sit with us for breakfast.”

“Shar,” the man, Jerry, says. “Come on, it’s their anniversary.”

“And it’s ours too, what’s your point?” Sharon reaches across and squeezes her husband's hand briefly. “Although we’re a bit further on than five years.”

Ava glances at the Captain, hoping to catch her eye, but sees that Lance is still staring at Jerry and Sharon. “Of course we’ll join you,” Lance says in a soft voice.

“Lance-” Ava starts.

“Ava,” says Lance, locking eyes. “We wouldn’t want to be rude.”

This is against protocol. So against protocol. What kind of recon is spent sitting among the locals, especially when there's the added danger of being caught out if you don’t behave as expected? This isn’t a normal party sneak. They should be assessing, not interacting. Ava grips her plate tight. There is no way Lance and Ava will pull this off.

“I thought,” says Ava, “that we were going to eat upstairs.”

“Upstairs?” Jerry quirks an eyebrow. “That good a night, eh? Looking for an encore?”

Ava coughs on nothing and puts down her empty plate. “No, uh, I’m just not feeling well.”

Lance reaches across and puts her hand on Ava’s. “Are you sure you can’t rally?” She glances at Sharon. “I feel like it’d be really nice to catch up. Beneficial, even.”

Ava wants to roll her eyes. Instead she lowers her head and looks at Lance through her hair, hoping she’ll get the message.

“Besides,” says Lance, “you said you thought food would help you feel better.”

“Oh come on, Ava.” Jerry bumps his elbow against Ava’s arm. “If you don’t feel better in a bit you can be on your way. But stay just long enough to schedule a pool rematch, please.”

Ava looks properly at Lance and sees that glint in her eye, the one that says she won’t back down. “I’ll try,” says Ava.

“All right!” Jerry smiles and gestures to a table in the corner. “We have our plates, join us when you’re set.” The couple walks hand-in-hand to the table, leaving Ava with Lance.

“What are you thinking?” Ava hisses the words as she steps next to Lance. She brushes shoulders with the other woman, attempting to look in love.

“They’ve already told us how long we’ve been coming here. What more could they share?”

“No, we’ve seen them for five years. Or we’ve been together for five years. That doesn’t tell us anything about this place or why we’re trapped.”

Lance sighs. “Just give it a few minutes,” she whispers. “In the meantime let’s get some food.” She leans over and scoops some oatmeal onto Ava’s plate.

“No,” says Ava. “I like-”

“It doesn’t matter what you like,” says Lance. “You put what you want on my plate, I do the same to yours, then we switch before we sit down.”

“Oh,” says Ava. The appearance of romance. She looks down at the oatmeal and smiles. After a breath she notices that Lance is still watching her. “Good idea, Lance.”

“Do you think my team will come?” Lance shuffles to the side and puts some cut fruit onto her plate. “That they're on their way?”

Ava follows Lance and steps closer to her shoulder. “I’m not sure.” No. “Is there any reason for them to think this isn’t normal? That we aren’t us?”

Lance nods to Ava’s plate. “Pick some food.”

Ava grabs a banana and a cup of yogurt. “They’re expecting this to take a while. The comms being off might have thrown them, but-”

Ava jumps as she feels Lance’s hand on her lower back, guiding her forward. “I had the same thoughts,” whispers Lance. She glances over to the table where Jerry and Sharon are waiting. “I think we might be on our own. Not just for catching the anachronism, but for figuring out how to get back where we belong.”

Ava begins moving towards the table, grabbing some more food as she goes. It’s clear that the Time Bureau isn’t coming either.

Five Years Earlier:

Book Marks. The name is scrawled on the same brown plank, painted in the same hand with an open book at the base. Sara leads the way inside, stopping to look at the display near the front. Ava picks up a book at random and flips through the pages.

“Hi folks!” Mark turns from the computer register with a wave for Sara and Ava. Ava lifts her hand in reply and almost calls his name, but stops herself.

“Hi,” says Sara. She walks over to lean against the counter. “How are you doing?”

Ava ducks behind a shelf in the middle of the room. She watches Mark pick up a book to scan.

“Good, good.” The scanner beeps. “If you need any help let me know.”

Sara leans a bit further on the counter, reaching for the book that Mark is holding.

“What’s this one, big guy?” She smirks at him with a question in her eye and Ava ducks her head as she listens.

“That’s, uh, that’s not-” Ava glances up to see Mark squint at the screen. He has a distinct blotch of red in his cheeks as he reaches for the book in Sara’s hand. “That one isn’t in the system yet, miss. If you wait a few minutes it’ll be all set. In the meantime feel free to browse our shelves.”

Sara holds his eye contact for a moment and he physically squirms under her gaze. “You’re kind,” he says, “but I’m set.”

Sara straightens up and lets her mouth fall open. “Oh, I’m sorry.” She stumbles a bit as she steps back, looking awkwardly surprised by her own attractiveness. Ava bites back a chuckle. “That’s not what I meant.” She drops her head with a blush. “I’m sorry.”

Mark shakes his head, not looking at Sara. “Don’t worry about it.”

Sara takes a step away from the counter before turning to join Ava behind the shelf. “I can’t believe you made me do that,” she whispers.

“You’re the one who thought we should push for a reaction to see if people really don’t know us.” And it was fun, Ava adds to herself. “Do you think he was faking?” Ava knocks her hip against Sara, then quickly steps away from the Captain. If he looks over Mark will see their heads shift as they stand together. She moves away, close enough to hear but far enough to avoid physical contact.

“No,” whispers Sara.

“Come on,” whispers Ava. “Let’s get some real intel.” She turns around and heads to the counter, Sara on her heels.

“Sorry to bother,” Ava says. “Me and my, uh, coworker here were given this shop’s name by a friend.”

Mark looks up from the screen, a tentative smile on his face. “Is that so? Which friend?”

“Flora,” says Sara. She moves to join Ava and puts her hand on the small of her back. Ava shifts sideways, out of her reach, willing Sara to remember to act like coworkers instead of lovers.

“Flora from down the street?” Mark looks at the book jacket in his hands and types a few numbers. “How do you know her?”

“Oh, just through visiting her shop. But we’ve gone for drinks with her on occasion too.” Sara smiles and glances at Ava. Sara doesn’t look embarrassed but her stance is tense. Ava wants to reach for her hand. Instead she tucks a strand of her own hair behind her ear.

“I’m Ava and this is Sara,” says Ava, holding out her hand.

“Mark,” says Mark. Ava grins as he cups her hand in his.

“Pleased to meet you, Mark.”

“Are you going to see Flora today?” Mark flips the book open to the copyright page. He seems more at ease talking to Ava and for a second she feels bad about having Sara flirt with him. Only for a second though, because Mark wears his feelings on his sleeve and he wouldn’t have been able to respond like that if he remembered her.

Ava smiles. “Probably. When in Rome.”

“You should get the graham cracker and toasted marshmallow ice cream. What’s she call it?”

Ava glances at Sara. They’d said Flora to gauge whether she was still around. Another point for being in the past, Ava thinks.

“Um,” Sara wavers. “I’m sure we’ll recognize it when we see it.”

“Thanks,” says Ava.

“In the meantime do you ladies have any questions about books I could help you with?” Mark gestures to the section that Ava staked out while listening to his conversation with Sara. “Anything on religion?”

Ava almost laughs. “Thank you, I was just browsing.” She turns and looks towards the back of the store. “Want to look at the fiction?” She is tempted to reach for Sara’s hand, to pull her back into the stacks.

“Sure,” says Sara. She smiles at Mark. “Thank you.”

Mark looks back at the screen and types something. “Any time, ladies.”

Ava steps between two rows and puts her hands on her hips. “This seems to be further proof that we could be in the past,” she whispers.

“I know. Especially since Flora is here.” Sara shrugs. “This doesn’t seem like an alternate universe. Not yet.” She moves to take Ava’s hand.

“No,” says Ava. She shifts her hand outside of Sara’s reach. “I keep wanting to hold your hand too. If we want this to work, this game we’re playing, we should avoid touches in private too.” She swallows. “Break the habit.”

Sara groans. “Babe, I-”

“You know I’m right.”

“I do.” Sara steps closer and drops her voice so it’s only audible due to how near Ava stands. “I just hate it.”

Ava gives a small frown. “Me too.” She turns to the shelves and picks a book. “This one?”

Sara smiles and reads the title. “I’ve never read it,” she says.

Ava laughs. “Me neither. Let’s go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy whatever day it is!
> 
> Thank you again for the comments, kudos, and bookmarks! I'm glad this is making people happy.
> 
> I might not post tomorrow - it's my wife's day off. If she gets a conference call or some last minute assignment(s) to handle you'll see an update, otherwise I'll see you again on *checks phone 'cause time means nothing now* Sunday.
> 
> Thanks again!


	4. Found Memories

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Past Ava and Sara go to gather gossip - I mean intel - at a local coffee shop. While there the patrons kinda freak them out.
> 
> Present Ava and Sara are all set to continue sleuthing when they are suddenly hit with new memories of a coffee shop and a flirty barista. Naturally they have to figure out what that's about.
> 
> This chapter grapples with a question for the ages: What if you suddenly developed memories of somewhere that you've never been so you go visit that place in your own past, thus causing you to create the memories you just received?

The sunlight makes Ava blink when she steps out of the hotel’s doorway. There aren’t any clouds in the sky as Lance squeezes her hand. “At least it’s nice out for our anniversary,” she says.

Ava wonders at her ability to always crack jokes as she gives a hard pull on the Captain’s fingers. “You wish,” she says.

“Hey!” says Lance. “You wound my hand and my pride.”

Rolling her eyes seems too responsive to Lace’s nonsense, although Ava admits that breakfast had gone fine. They have no new info but Ava feels more confident in their ability to act passably affectionate. She sighs. “Where should we go first?” Ava scans the road in front of them, the narrow cobblestone matching her memories from the night before.

“This way,” says Lance. She turns right decisively, yanking Ava along. “Fancy some coffee?”

“We just had breakfast,” says Ava.

“Yeah, but where better to get some local gossip?”

“Intel,” says Ava. She shakes her head at Lance’s grin. “We’re not here to make friends, Captain.”

“Oh, I know.” Lance opens the door for Ava with a flourish. She pulls Ava towards the counter before releasing her hand and leaning towards Ava. “Now tell me, what do you want?”

“Welcome to Cafe Leche,” says a redheaded woman behind the counter. “What can I get you today?” She’s oblivious to the fact that Lance and Ava are mid-conversation. Ava checks her out, enjoying the light in her green eyes and her smile. Realizing what she’s doing, Ava flicks her eyes up to the menu. It doesn’t really matter what she orders.

“I’ll have a dark roast. Medium with two sugars,” says Lance.

“And you?” The redhead eyes Ava up and down and gives her a wink. Ava feels her shoulders stiffen at the attention.

“Just a small tea. Something herbal.” She steps towards Lance, who wraps an arm around her waist. A great way to avoid fraternizing with the people in this timeline, Ava thinks.

“Want a muffin or anything, muffin?” Lance sounds like she’s teasing Ava as she says the words and Ava wants to step on her foot.

“No thank you.” Ava looks at the barista. “We’re set with the drinks.”

“They’ll be right up.” The woman holds out her hand and Ava looks to Lance, wondering what she could want. The Captain pulls out the wallet she found and hands over a card to pay for the drinks. Ava unwinds herself from Lance’s grip to get a table.

“Hey,” the barista calls. Ava turns back. “Anything in your something herbal tea?’

“No thanks,” Ava says. She pulls a chair out at a table for two near the corner. When the drinks are up Lance bings them over and hands Ava one of the cups.

“There’s nothing in the rules about accepting drinks from trained assassins, is there?” Lance grins as she takes her seat.

“Ha,” says Ava. “You’re funny.” She scans the other tables to assess the patrons and relaxes a bit when she notices that Lance is doing the same. A few of the people glance back at Ava when they feel her gaze but they quickly go back to their food, beverage, or company.

“Doesn’t seem like anyone here knows us,” says Lance. She leans over her coffee and pops the plastic cover off to blow on the steaming liquid.

“No, it doesn’t.” Ava pops the top off hers too. She watches Lance for a moment before turning back to eye the counter. “That woman certainly doesn’t know us”

“But she wants to know one of us,” says Lance. She gives a brief chuckle before blowing on the liquid again.

“Right,” says Ava. “Surprised she doesn’t prefer you?”

Lance looks at the table between them and smirks. “She must go for tall girls.”

“Oh, is that it?” Ava moves to take a swift sip of her tea even though it’s too hot. She only gets some steam in her mouth. Saying flirty things will help them look like a couple, surely. “Is that your excuse then?”

Lance reaches over and puts a hand over Ava’s, squeezing her knuckles. “I can’t tell what draws me to you,” she says. “Only what annoys me.”

Ava really laughs, pulling her hand back to fish the tea packet from her drink and place it on the lid. “That’s hardly-”

“Sharpe.” Lance cuts Ava off and gestures over her shoulder. Ava turns to see one of the patrons, a man with a child sitting in a chair closeby, waving over at them. He locked eyes with Ava when she first sat down, a gesture that had given away no signs of recognition. Ava smiles and waves back because what the hell else is she supposed to do?

“Why does he suddenly seem to know us?” Ava keeps her mouth mostly closed through the question.

“I don’t know, but others are kinda turning to us now.” Lance turns and Ava follows suit, receiving nods and waves from many of the patrons. She attempts to sip her tea again, trying to follow this change in atmosphere.

“Somethings changing,” Ava whispered. “Their personalities, their natural friendliness.”

“Ava! Sara!” The redhead from the counter is walking to their table, a cake of some kind with two spoons on a small plate. “Have a treat on us. Happy anniversary!” Her voice carries her words throughout the shop as she places the dish on the table between Lance and Ava. Some of the other people in the shop clap or whoop at the statement, and many more smile over at them politely. The barista turns to Lance first, then Ava. But her attraction is hidden this time as she looks at the agent. She seems almost shy. “Five years is a long time for a relationship. Congratulations.”

“Thank you,” says Lance. Ava nods and picks up one of the spoons as the redhead walks back to the counter with one glance over her shoulder.

Lance scoffs. “Five years is a long ass time to hold a crush too.”

“Their memories are changing,” whispers Ava. It makes sense. At first none of the people here recognized them, but now they were treating them like friends. Or more than acquaintances, at least.

“Seems to be the case,” says Lance. She puts her spoon into the cake and takes a bite. Ava almost laughs at the idea of doing something as intimate as sharing a romantic cake with Lance. Instead she smiles and puts her own spoon to the cake, on the opposite side that Lance ate from. This acting is getting too personal, but Ava can’t think about pulling back now. They have to work out what the hell is happening and how to get back home.

Five Years Earlier:

“Here you are, Ava, was it?” Bob is holding out the bagged book with a smile. Ava accepts the bag and thanks him, then reaches for Sara’s hand. She realizes her mistake and pulls back a moment before making contact. As the two women walk forward Ava looks out the window and stops. Across the street is a cafe with a sign sporting a coffee bean and a jug of milk. Cafe Leche always looks inviting, but Sara and Ava have never been in the place.

Sara is at the door. “Are you coming?”

“Look at that coffee shop,” says Ava.

“What about it?” Sara steps next to Ava to look and suddenly her facial expression goes from curious to confused. Ava blinks as she remembers what the inside is like, warm and inviting. The cute redhead who always smiles at her a bit longer than at Sara. The taste of their house blend coffee, smooth and never burnt. The mango tea that Ava has Gideon fabricate on the Waverider that she first discovered at that very cafe.

“Did you just get, like, a brain dump of memories about that place?” Sara is still looking at the cafe, her confusion morphing into shock.

“Yes,” says Ava. “We’d best go there.”

Sara leads the way across the street, stepping through the door without holding it open for Ava. Ava huffs at the gesture although she knows that Sara is acting. She hopes her annoyance at the game comes off as disdain for her coworker.

“Ladies, good morning. What can I get for you?”

The redhead matches Ava’s new memories. She is almost Ava’s height and beautiful. Ava knows she's noticed her looks before. Sue, Ava thinks, as she looks at the familiar menu.

“I’ll have a coffee,” says Sara. “Two sugars, dark roast. Medium.”

Sue hits a couple of buttons on the register. “And you, gorgeous?”

Ava almost laughs as she feels Sara tense beside her. “Tea. Mango, with just a splash of milk. Make it a medium too.”

“And what name should I put on the order?”

Ava doesn’t recall Sue asking it quite that way before. Sara gives her own while Ava reaches for her wallet to pay.

“Thank you,” says Sue. She reaches for the card and glances at it. “Ava Sharpe.”

Sara rolls her eyes and sighs. Ava hopes that Sara’s pissed off and jealous reality can be read as annoyance at the morning. Or having to go to work.

“I’m Sue.” Sue swipes the card before handing it back.

“Nice to meet you, Sue.” Sara says. She turns to Ava. “We’ll take these to go, yes?”

Ava smiles. ‘Sure.” She turns back to Sue. “Thank you.”

“Any time.” Sue touches a finger to Ava’s hand as she passes over the receipt for Ava to sign.

“She’s so obvious” Sara shifts a step closer to Ava and taps her foot on the ground as they wait for their drinks, away from the counter.

“It’s fine,” Ava says. “We’ll be out of here soon enough and you’ll never have to see her again.”

“Evidently you’re wrong ‘cause I’ve got a head full of memories of her subtly flirting with you right now.” Sara accepts her drink from the barista who made it while Ava takes her own. “But evidently I really like the coffee. Can we get out of here now?”

“Of course,” says Ava. “We’ve got to get to work, don’t we?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Thanks for the kudos and comments. I love reading them!
> 
> I was able to make this into a draft last night so I'm just hitting post today. My past self was ready!
> 
> I enjoyed writing this chapter - it's fun to play around with memories and our understanding of our own actions.
> 
> If you have any specific questions let me know in the comments and I'll do my best to answer them. Heck, if you see anything that you think needs ironing out also let me know. I don't have any betas and am only giving each chapter one quick edit before posting.
> 
> Thanks!


	5. Lunch and Rescue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Past Ava and Sara are roped into having lunch with some strangers that seem to love them and are way too fond of hugging for Ava's taste.
> 
> Future Ava and Sara run to the park 'cause Ava remembers a thing that happened there five years ago. Sara is annoyed until she's not.
> 
> In the second section of this story there are descriptions of some injuries. The injuries aren't enough to warrant a rating change, but I thought I'd give you a head's up nonetheless.

Lance switches her coffee to her left hand and links her right arm through Ava’s left. She leans towards Ava with a confidence that gives Ava pause. “Where do you want to go now, Sharpe?”

“We shouldn’t go into any random store again. We probably altered the timeline. Changed our futures or our pasts, at least in whatever world this all exists.”

“True,” says Lance. She looks thoughtful for a moment. “So we only interact with people who initiate conversation. Who seem to know us.”

“Yup,” says Ava. “That’s standard operating-”

“No flirting with cute baristas then, Sharpe.” Lance brushes her shoulder against Ava as they walk.

Ava rolls her eyes before continuing to scan the milling crowds. “Good luck taking your own advice,” she says.

“I’ll have to spend all of my time flirting with you then, won’t I?” Lance shifts to kiss Ava’s cheek.

Ava doesn’t want to blush, she doesn’t want to feel that crawl of attraction up her back. She wants to shove Lance back and tell her off. She compromises by pushing Lance in a way that could be perceived as friendly, but she growls at the same time. “Lay off.”

“You like-”

Lance is cut off by an excited yell down the street. Ava and Lance both look forward, Ava’s eyes going wide as she separates her arm from Lance. A boy of around nine slams into her waist, sending her back half a step.

“Michael!” A man with blonde hair and brown eyes jogs up to the three people. He laughs at Ava’s look. “You know Ava doesn’t like when you do that,” he says.

The boy laughs, gives Ava an extra squeeze, and steps back. Without hesitation he turns to throw himself at Lance too.

“Hi,” says Ava. She brushes a hand down her shirtfront as though trying to wipe the indignanty of the hug from her outfit. She looks to the side and watches Lance duck down to give the boy a proper hug. The two women share a look in which Lance appears to be saying that she doesn’t know what else to do.

“Hi!” The man pulls Ava into a brief hug before letting her go. “I didn’t know you were coming this weekend. Have you had lunch yet?”

“Lunch?” Ava asks as the boy releases Lance, who stands up. “No, but-”

“Great! You should join us.”

“Yes!” The boy takes Lance’s hand in his own and smiles at them. “Dad’s right, you have to come for lunch.”

“Well,” Lance says. She pushes her hand through her hair. “We do have plans for our-”

“Yeah, you’re fifth, but when was the last time we saw each other? Come on, I’ll treat. We’ll go to that place with the great sandwiches. They’re quick.” The man gives an elegant little bow and holds out an arm to Ava. “I know he’ll want to escort your lovely partner,” he says with a nod to Lance and Michael.

“Okay fine,” says Ava. She sighs as she puts a hand on the man’s arm, hoping this is how the Lance-loving version of herself would interact with this person. The man seems convinced as he leads the way. He asks about their morning as they head to this mysterious restaurant, and tells them his favorite Cafe Leche order as he turns down a sidestreet. There’s an outdoor restaurant practically on the corner, complete with a wide awning and umbrella-covered tables.

“I’ll order if you watch the little dude?” The man smiles at Ava in a way that is far too trusting coming from a stranger. Ava has to remind herself that he thinks he knows her.

“Why don’t you both go?” Lance sits down next to the boy with a smile. “I can watch Mike.”

“You know I don’t like being called that,” says Michael. He sticks out his tongue as he takes his seat.

“Why do you think I said it?” Lance leans over to tickle him as Michael’s father turns to the door with Ava. He shakes his head as they enter the cafe.

“Go ahead and order,” says the man. Ava looks at the menu and frowns. What would  
Lance want? A sandwich of some kind, probably. She thinks about her breakfast of oatmeal and cut fruit. Lance goes for practical, Ava realizes with a start. Something that she wouldn’t have expected about the Captain’s taste.

“Can I get a veggie wrap with goat cheese and-” Ava glances at the menu again, “a turkey club.” Ava would eat either, but she has an idea of which Lance would prefer.

“Branching out?” The man steps up and places his order for himself and Michael.

“Under what name?”

“Jared,” the man supplies. Ava smiles to herself, realizing why Lance sent her in here. The pair talk idly as they wait for their food to be called, Ava working to keep the conversation light. How Michael’s spent the morning, the anniversary that she and Lance are celebrating.

“Thank you Jared,” Ava says as she gathers the food and heads outside. She notices a smirk playing at Lance’s lips. Insufferable. Although Ava can’t suppress her own smile when Lance accepts the veggie wrap with a happy look of surprise.

The group tucks into their food for a few minutes, Michael occasionally telling a story  
about his friends or saying that he’s excited to be with Lance and Ava again. Ava can’t help wondering why this boy would call her by her first name. Although she concedes that requiring him to call her an agent might be going too far, she thinks that Sharpe would be a fine form of address.

They’re almost through the meal when Jared says something that makes Ava turn her head.

“I can’t believe it’s been five years since you saved me.”

“Saved you?”

“I know,” Jared says. “I know it’s your anniversary too, but I always think of this as the weekend you saved my life.”

“Surely that’s going a bit-” Lance puts down the last bit of her wrap.

“No, no. You always do that. You did save me. Michael saw you, and I know it was easy considering your-” He lowers his voice and looks around as though expecting someone to be recording the conversation. “-technology or whatever, but still. A life saved is a life saved, and I am grateful.”

Michael leans forward, his elbow on the table. “Are you gonna tell them now, Dad?”

Jared chuckles. “Michael wants to invite you both to his school play. He’s going to be the captain of a ship, sailing through uncharted territories and converting bandits to his side.” He laughs. “It’s not quite a time ship, but should still be fun.”

Lance smiles easily as she sits back in her chair. “When it is?” She makes eye contact with Ava for a moment and allows her face to form into panic and fear. It’s there for barely a second. Ava reaches over and takes her hand, this time not as a nod towards their cover but to offer true support.

“Next Friday, five pm. Here.” Jared digs in his pocket and pulls out a folded flyer. “Come if you can. I know it’d make Michael-”

“It’d be so cool if you came!” Michael sits up straighter and nods to Lance. “I’ve based my acting on you.”

Ava can’t resist a laugh. “What, her mannerisms?”

Michael smiles. “And the way she gets around you. That’s how I’m gonna be around my girlfriend in the play ‘cause you’re really in love.”

“Right.” Ava looses the laugh and looks at her hand on Lance’s. She wants to move it, but the contact is kind of comfortable. Instead she looks at the remnants on her plate.

“We’ll see if we can come. How can we let you-”

“Don’t worry about contacting us,” says Jared. “If you can make it, great. If not we’ll know you’re saving the world.” He smiles in that easy way and ruffles Michael’s hair. “If anyone will understand-”

“Oh yeah, it’s us.” Michael leans over and puts a hand on Lance’s arm, then shifts over towards his dad instead.

“Well,” Lance glances at Ava. “We hate to eat and run-”

“Yes, your plans. Of course.” Jared stands up and when Ava moves to do the same he pulls her into a hug. “I will never be done thanking you,” he says as he moves to hug Lance too.

“And, I mean, you’re welcome.” Lance hugs him back before giving Michael a side hug. After all goodbyes are given Lance pulls Ava along by her hand, breaking her look at the father and son. She leans towards Ava with a cringe. “He knows about the Waverider,” she says. “Could he be tied to the anachronism?”

“I don’t know,” says Ava. She shifts to link her arm with Lance. “If he was really hurt five years back would you have taken him onboard?”

Lance sighs. “We’ve done it before, but we usually wipe memories after.”

Ava shrugs. “Let’s keep him in mind. In the meantime keep your eyes open.” She returns a wave to a man reading in a lawn chair on a balcony.

Five Years Earlier:

“Memories.” Sara touches a hand to her forehead as she walks. “What else is new, besides that hottie hitting on you?”

“Sara.” Ava starts to roll her eyes but stops. She stands still for a moment. “Wait. Do you think this is the first time we’re here?”

Turning back, Sara raises her eyebrows. “I don’t know. That’s kind of the problem.”

“No, I mean if it is we have to go to the park.” Ava looks around, searching for a clock and finding one on a bank. “Now.” She starts jogging down the cobblestone, not looking back to see if Sara’s coming.

“Sharpe!” Sara calls out before Ava hears her sigh and begins to run too. Together they make their way through the crowd, glad that no one seems to care who they are. Ava skids to a stop ten minutes later at the entrance. The park is backed by 300 miles of protected forest.

“Remember,” Sara leans over to catch her breath, “why we came here the first time?”

“I’m more focused on the results of that choice,” pants Ava. She turns into the park, walking faster than normal down the marked path. She doesn’t bother stopping at the kiosk to get a map.

“It was because we were fighting,” says Sara. “After we found the-”

“Will you stop reminiscing and just help?” Ava starts jogging again. When she reaches a fork in the path she immediately turns to go right, following a trail that covers the same sort of terrain with which the park began. She pauses.

Sara came alongside and grins. “Need help, Agent Sharpe?”

“It’s been five years,” Ava says. She looks to the left, down a path covered with vines and close-standing trees on one side. The other side of the path begins to drop off, the start of which will eventually lead to a steep cliff alongside the path. “Just give me a second.”

“This way,” says Sara. She grabs Ava’s forearm and pulls her to the left and both women break into a comfortable jog down the hill. They don’t speak as they keep moving forward. Two more turns and they round a corner where a man in his twenties is walking with a boy who’s maybe five. Ava slows to a walk and waves to the man. She hears Sara stop beside her and cough, trying to catch her breath without seeming intentional.

“Hi,” the blonde man says. His boy waves, then jumps over one of the protruding roots that cross the path. The man laughs.

“Target acquired,” mumbles Sara. Ava almost laughs but stops herself. She keeps walking past him, hoping Sara will get the idea.

“Should we just distract them now?” Sara rubs her shoulder against Ava’s arm. “Save him the pain.”

“No,” says Ava. “We’ll be here, us from the past, in a few minutes.” I hope, she thought.

“What, you ran us here to watch us be heroes?” Sara raises an eyebrow at Ava as they truly leave Jared and Michael behind.

“No,” says Ava. She turns around to stay out of sight but near the pair. Close enough to hear the exciting babbling of father and son.

“Then what?” Sara’s eyes go wide. “Ava,” she whispers. “Did you bring us here to watch ourselves get together? ‘Cause after we take them we come back and-”

“No!” Ava grabs Sara’s arm. “Can you please be quiet so we can listen? I’ll tell you in a minute.”

“Fine,” Sara whispers.

“Whoa!” The quiet banter of father and son is disrupted by the yell, and then the sound of a body falling down. Rolling. Ava jumps forward to see the scene ahead. Michael is at the side of the path, near the edge, looking down the steep cliff. Ava remembers seeing the man lying at the bottom of his fall, his leg twisted. She creeps forward a few feet, waiting.

“Where are we?” Sara is at her arm. “We heard the noise. We came running, maybe within five seconds.”

“I remember,” said Ava. She reaches around to grab Sara’s arm. “We have a choice to make.”

“Dad?” Michael calls down the cliff face, peering over the edge.

“We’re not coming,” says Ava. “So in this time, this possible other world, do we interfere?” It’s against protocol but Ava wants to. She needs to help this man.

Sara nods. “Of course we do.”

Ava sighs. “I agree.” She releases Sara’s arm, gives her a quick kiss on the cheek, and steps out onto the path. Quickly both women approach Michael, stopping next to him. Ava looks down at Jared.

“Go,” says Sara. She drops to her knees and turns to the boy, who immediately starts crying. He gasps out that he wants to climb down and help his dad but he’s scared. Sara looks at Ava and mouths that she’s got this.

Ava turns to the cliff face. In her memories she uses her time courier to transport herself, Sara, and Michael down to Jared, then transports them to the Waverider’s medbay. Ava swallows and grabs one of the thin trees along the cliff. Slowly she lowers herself to a squat and begins making her way down the incline. She leans back so her weight is as far back as possible, preventing herself from tumbling forward. She hears the snap of twigs under her feet and Sara reassuring Michael, and almost slips forward when a low groan comes from Jared’s heap of pain. One misplaced step in pine needles makes her lose her footing for a moment, but Ava catches hold of two thin trees. They bend, but stop her. Ava breathes out, blowing a strand of hair that’s fallen from her bun out of her face.

She wants to call Jared by his name. It will be reassuring, she knows.

“Jared?” Ava is almost to the bottom when she slips again. She regains her footing and glances up to see Sara hugging Michael. “Jared.” She turns to him and drops to her knees. He groans.

“I know,” she says. Ava reaches out and touches his cheek. She’s seen him like this before, but it was only for a few minutes before Gideon was able to scan, diagnose, and begin treating him. “Okay,” Ava says. “Your leg is broken. Bleeding.” Ava looks down at herself and realizes, dimly, that she is wearing the wrong outfit to create a tourniquet. She unbuttons the bottom of her shirt and tears off a quarter of the fabric, as close to a straight line as she can. She scans the ground and grabs a somewhat thick stick. After looping the cloth around his thigh she puts the stick in place then ties it against his leg. He goans again, not opening his eyes.

“Good, good.” Ava closes her eyes and tries to remember his medscan. “You also have a decent concussion, although there’s not a lot I can do about that. What else?” She looks him over but he seems more or less set. But there was something. He groans again.

“Ava!” Sara calls down the cliff, still holding Michael. “Is he set?”

“No,” Ava calls back. She looks at him again, willing herself to remember. What else? He looks to have a sheen on him, so Ava shifts to feel his forehead. Clammy. She drops her hand to his neck although by this time she remembers. Shock. Almost before they get him onto the Waverider he stops breathing. Ava touches his throat and feels his skin, cold and clammy with a very faint pulse. Too faint. Without thinking she pulls him onto his back. She tilts his head back and pauses, listening for his breath. There is a faint gasp, but it’s like the remnants of life. Ava places her left hand, then her right with her fingers intertwined, onto the center of his chest. “Let’s go Jared.”

The chest compressions are heavy. Ava leans forward as she pushes down, using her body weight to increase the pressure. She feels his ribs beneath her hands, uncomfortably flexing under her movements. Ava counts, aiming for 100 compressions in 60 seconds. She does not breathe for him but keeps up the pace as she begins to feel his sweat through his shirt. Ava pauses long enough to wipe her forehead against her bicep then begins again on a new count.

“Come on, Jared.”

“Ava!” Sara calls from up top. “He’s in shock, right?” 

Ava hears Michael start to speak, start to ask how, when Jared opens his eyes. Ava jumps back as he takes a long breath, staring at her but probably not fully awake. Ava scoots forward to lift his head. “Jared, it’s ok. You’re ok.” She runs her other hand through his hair as he focuses on her, his breathing erratic. She talks to him intermittently as she waits for him to steady. “Jared, you did great. I haven’t had to perform CPR in the field for years, and you did so well.”

“How-” Jared coughs as he tries to catch his breath while speaking. “How do you know me?”

“That is a long story, one I would love to tell you over a meal later. In the meantime-” Ava waves up to Sara and Michael. “He’s good, he’s fine!” She calls the words and watches Michael, like he had in her memories on the Waverider, cling to Sara with a quiet desperation and relief. She can remember his expression even though she can’t see it now.

“Meet us that way?” Sara points back where they came, down to where the cliff face meets the path.

“Might be a while,” calls Ava. She looks again to Jared, who shifts as he lifts his torso. “No, sit back a minute,” she says.

“My boy.” Jared pulls himself up as best he can to a sitting position, then looks to his leg. “You patched me up first? Before I...”

“I forgot,” says Ava.

Jared looks at her like nothing about her makes sense. Not her words, her falling apart bun of hair, her life-saving hands.

“That you go in shock, I mean.” Ava shifts to get under his arm on the side with the bleeding leg. “Let’s get you up.”

Jared helps as best he can but Ava realizes that she’ll be carrying about 190-odd pounds of man for at least ten minutes. Resigned, she really jams her shoulder up under his arm. He wraps his arm around her waist and it’s only when his fingers touch her stomach that she truly regrets her choice of tourniquet material. Slowly, painfully, they make their way to Sara and Michael. When they do Sara nods at Ava before turning to Jared. She smiles before grabbing a phone from his pants pocket to call 9-1-1.

“How did you find us?” Michael’s cheeks are still tracked with tears, but his gaze is level. “Are you super heroes?”

Sara chuckles. “You wouldn’t believe us.”

Jared, still leaning against Ava, gives a dry laugh-cough. “You know my name. You know-” He slumps forward for a second and Ava takes a step to counterbalance the shift in his weight. “You know what’s wrong with me. Try us, we’ll believe.”

Ava looks over at Sara, who is watching the agent as though seeking permission. Ava glances away to hide her smile. Sara Lance looking for permission still makes her feel shy. She nods, letting Sara share their truth as Ava takes the phone to speak with the emergency dispatcher. In all of Ava’s memories Jared and Michael know who they are and about the Waverider. Sara will show them the time ship later, according to Ava's memories.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Ava and Sara are never gonna catch a break. But Jared did!
> 
> (I'm sorry! I usually say terrible puns to customers at work but now I am reduced to torturing you, poor readers.)
> 
> Thank you once again for the kudos and comments. Keep 'em coming, if you'd like. I really enjoy reading your thoughts!
> 
> Also if you celebrate Easter I hope it's great! If you don't then I hope you have a spectacular Sunday! (Well, as spectacular as any day can be right now.)
> 
> <3


	6. Knowing and Planning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Past Ava and Sara have no idea what's happening, but boy howdy do they have a plan.
> 
> Future Ava and Sara figure out what's happening, but they sure do lack a plan.
> 
> This is ideal, right?

The road is getting more crowded and the sun’s really shining. Ava thinks her hand must be uncomfortably damp in Lance’s grip from both the weather and the contact. At the same time, though, she’s becoming accustomed to the contact. And Lance’s hand doesn’t feel slick to Ava, so maybe she’s worrying for nothing.

“We should go back-”

“The hotel might be-”

Ava chuckles in Lance’s direction as they both stop talking. Lance smiles and nods for Ava to speak.

“Thanks,” says Ava. “We should go to the hotel. Regroup. Discuss what could be happening and try to formulate a plan.”

Lance smiles. “That’s exactly what I was going to say. When we get there though you’ll have to let go of my hand. I know how fond of me you’ve become, Sharpe.”

Ava glances down at their interlaced fingers before Lance continues.

“I’m a righty. Any note taking will require that hand.”

Ava sighs and shoves her shoulder into Lance, keeping hold of her hand. But she also can’t help smiling in return. The two women continue to nod or say hi to those on the street who interact with them. When they reach the hotel Ava opens the door for Lance, smiling as she walks through.

“So chivalrous,” says Lance.

“Only for you babe.” Ava enjoys the way Lance flicks her eyes over to Ava at the pet name. Ava hides her amusement with a straight face as she follows Lance through the lobby and to the elevators. Pushing back is absolutely the best response to Lance’s goofiness.

Once in their room Ava closes and locks the door. She stands for a moment, then opens the door to hang the Do Not Disturb sign on the nob. She hears Lance laughing as she slides the swinging door bar guard and clicks the deadbolt into place.

“Think we need guaranteed privacy?”

Ava smiles as she turns back, and she thinks for just a second about stepping to Sara and taking her hand again. Lance. Stepping to Lance. Ava clears her throat. “So what do you think?”

“This whole day has been weird.” Lance steps to the chair, drops the suitcase on the floor, and sits down. “It’ll be damn hard to sort this out, but we can do it.”

“Great, my optimism is filled up. Thanks.” Ava rolls her eyes and crosses her arms over her chest. “What do you think, specifically, about what is happening? Got any theories, Captain Lance?”

“God, you can call me Sara.” Lance swings her feet around so she’s sitting sideways on the chair, her feet hanging off the armrest. “I wish there was a minibar in here.”

Insufferable. Can Lance not focus for five minutes? Ava opens her mouth to demand that Lance answer the question when the Captain looks at her with a grin that is welcoming, not smug. The same look that Sara wore when she spoke with Michael. And Lance knew that sending Ava into the cafe with Jared would allow her to learn the man’s name. Ava must admit that there might be some benefit to a more lax approach. And honestly she could use a drink too. “Well.” Ava walks over to the discarded suitcase and pulls out a bottle of whiskey she remembers seeing in the morning. “Will this do?”

“Perfect.” Lance says as Ava twists off the top. “A toast?”

Ava smiles, wondering why she’s doing this instead of focusing on their plan. It just feels right, she realizes. And maybe they can multitask. Blow off some steam while coming up with a solution. “To anachronisms that screw with our heads.” She takes a swig and holds the bottle out to Lance.

“Well, Ava Sharpe.” Lance grasps the bottle and grins. “I am toasting to kicking the ass of anachronisms that screw with our heads.” She tips the bottle in Ava’s direction before taking her own hearty swig. “Okay, theories.”

“Theories,” echoes Ava. She watches Lance drop her elbows onto her thighs, swaying the bottle between her knees.

“I don’t got any,” says Lance. “Although I’m open to hearing your theories. Or talking about what we know and trying to put some together.”

“Hmm.” Ava reaches for the bottle while Lance gives her a smirk. “I don’t know of any anachronisms that could cause us to jump into alternate versions of ourselves. At least not both of us at once.”

“Helpful,” says Lance. Ava takes a second drink and hands the bottle back over.

“I’m fairly certain we’re not in another universe though,” says Ava. “If we were I don’t think the memories of the people around us would change as the day goes on.”

Sara taps a finger against the bottle. “Something must have caused those changes. Do you think there are people living as us in the time we came from, changing the timeline and therefore the memories of those we are seeing here, now?”

“Maybe?” Ava sits down on the floor next to Lance, close enough to continue to pass the bottle. “Or the anachronism is affecting our memories too.”

“But we’d have noticed if it was actively changing our memories in the moment, right?” Lance takes a sip and passes the bottle to Ava.

Ava shakes her head. “How do you notice something when it’s in your own head? I don’t know, Sara.” She flicks her fingernail against the bottle after saying the name, trying out the sound of each. She hears Lance shift in the chair.

“You used my first name.”

“I suppose I did, Lance.” Ava shifts to look at Sara, who is turned on her stomach to watch Ava over the arm of the chair. Lance looks smug.

“I have a theory.” Sara reaches down to touch Ava’s shoulder and Ava pulls back a hair. Lance’s fingers graze her shirt.

“Yes?”

Lance widens her eyes like it’s important. “What if we’re the anachronism?”

Ava laughs, takes a drink, and hands the bottle back up. “Right.”

“No but what if we are? If our actions in the past weren’t right so they’re being changed. By us at another time, maybe?”

“That would break the timeline,” says Ava.

Sara humphs and kind of slouches in the chair. “I suppose you’re right.”

“Of course I am.”

“But Ava, what if you’re not?”

Ava smacks at Lance’s hand, still hanging from the chair. “I’m not, Sara.”

“But shouldn’t we test all theories?” Lance sits up, caps the bottle, and puts it on the floor next to the chair.

“No.” Ava laughs. “How would we even test that?”

“We could change this timeline. We’ve been following these rules and acting like a couple. Jumping through the expectations of people here we’ve never even-”

“No.” Ava shifts into a straighter position. “Absolutely not.”

“Why not? We go outside, have a very public fight. Maybe we throw things. If it doesn’t work we publically make up and all’s fine in this world.” Sara stands up and steps to the middle of the room with a look down at Ava.

“No!” Ava stands up too. “We still aren’t even sure whether we’re in another universe or not. If there is an anachronism or something at work that could draw their attention-”

“You said that you thought we were in another time, not another universe.”

“‘I thought’ doesn’t mean ‘I’m positive’, Captain Lance.”

Lance slumps her shoulders with an exaggerated sigh. “And here we go. Now that we’re disagreeing you’re back to the rigid formalities and the rules.”

“The rules protect us, Sara. They protect humanity.”

Lance takes a step closer to Ava and raises a finger. “If we don’t break the rules we won’t figure out how to go back. And if we can’t go back we’re here forever, pretending to be this perfect couple and calling each other babe while feeling nothing but trapped.”

Ava takes a step back and tilts her head to the side. Lance is, in a way, right. If this doesn’t work they’ll remain here, stuck in this farce. And if it does work they’ll be home. There is a chance that something worse could happen, Ava knows, but honestly at least that might give them more of a lead to follow. And although Sara has been tolerable all day Ava knows that they’d both grow resentful of a forced relationship.

“Fine,” Ava says. “Let’s have this same argument in front of a crowd, about something mundane.” She looks Sara up and down, her eyes pausing at the Captain’s throat before she swallows and meets her eyes. “You pick our fight.”

Five Years Earlier:

“We’re in the past.” Sara is a stride in front of Ava so she turns back as she speaks.

“Agreed,” says Ava. She shakes her head and steps up to walk alongside Sara. “Five years in the past, to the day. There’s one magical creature that plays with people like this, but I’ve never heard of them affecting two subjects at once.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. They’re reptilian. They inhabit a room until the same person at two different times enters that space. They can then swap the minds and memories of the two versions of that person. After twenty-four hours the switch becomes permanent.”

Sara shakes her head. “Sounds about right. Why didn’t you think of this creature before?”

Ava sighs. “I’ve never seen one, or even proof that they exist outside of lore. I only know as much as I do because Mona was telling me that she wants to write one into the next Rebecca Silver novel.”

“Of course,” says Sara. She reaches back to nudge Ava’s arm.

“I wasn’t exactly thinking about the conversation in regard to my work.”

Sara smiles. “No worries. Now do you happen to remember, babe, how to make the switch back happen?”

“I have an idea,” says Ava. “Let’s go back to the hotel.”

Sara sighs. “Can’t we stop there?” She points to a restaurant with outdoor seating. “We could get a drink, sit in a corner, brainstorm, and jot ideas to your heart's content.”

Ava pauses to look at the awning and the umbrella covered tables. “I don’t know, I’d love to change.” She gestures down to her abdomen, still exposed.

Sara winks. “I don’t think the view is half bad.”

“Good for you,” says Ava. She shrugs her shoulders in an uncomfortable sort of way, although she wants to grin at Sara’s obvious attraction.

“Oh fine.” Sara grabs Ava’s wrist and huffs like she’s annoyed as she pulls Ava into a store next to the restaurant. It’s one of those tourist places that sells a rainbow of t-shirts with the same generic phrases that could be applicable to five different cities. There are also keychains with generic names printed on them and a wide variety of shot glasses. “Pick a shirt.”

Ava scoffs as she looks at the selection. “None of these are really my style.”

“And spending another twenty minutes of our remaining twenty-four hours walking isn’t really my style. Pick or I’ll get you this one.” Sara pulls out a large t-shirt that is covered in beer cans. Some of them are standing up, some are knocked on their sides, but all are Christmas red and Beebo blue. The cans even cover the sleeves and the back.

“That company’s local!” A teenager calls from a nearby aisle. “I hear it, uh, tastes great too.”

“Excellent,” says Sara. She drapes the shirt over her arm. “You have two minutes, Sharpe.”

“Umm…” Ava turns to the nearest rack and begins flipping through shirts. She quickly pulls out a tan t-shirt with the name of the town across the chest. “This one’s perfect, Sara.”

Sara smiles. “I prefer mine.” She puts the beer shirt back and Ava sees the teen stick his head around the shelving with a disappointed look. Ava smiles at him before heading to the register with Sara. After they pay Ava slips into the bathroom and discards her torn white shirt for the tourist nightmare.

At least she won’t look like she got mugged by someone who demanded a shirt-made scarf.

The table is far enough from other patrons that both Ava and Sara feel comfortable quietly discussing their plans. They move their chairs alongside one another, each with a drink at hand. Ava pulls a flip notebook from her pocket. “Got a pen?” Sara rolls her eyes before getting up to ask at the bar. She returns victorious, although Ava pulls a face when she feels the sticky plastic.

“It would have matched the beer shirt,” Sara says as she sits down.

“Ha.” Ava wants to lean over and kiss that cocky grin off Sara’s face. Instead she begins writing down what they know. They are five years in the past, on the first day of their visit to this area. On the day they started dating. Sara supplies some info about their day so far, outlining how their memories have changed and what that might demonstrate about the actions of their past selves in their own future.

“Okay,” says Sara. “This gives us a pretty good outline of information about our past selves. But how do we swap back?”

Ava bites her lip for a second before taking a sip from her drink. “We have to be in the same place as our swapped selves at the same moment of the day.”

“Wait, what?” Sara tilts her head sideways as she thinks. “So you and I now have to go to the same place as the you and I then?”

“Yes.”

“At the same time? So you’re telling me that if we, the other we, where to sit down in this cafe right now we’d switch back?”

Ava sighs. “Yes. That is the problem with this particular switch. Reversing it requires precision.”

“Precision.” Sara turns the notebook to look at the sketch of the day and how it’s changed in their heads. “Our future-past selves aren’t even following the actions that our current-past selves took back then.”

“I know.” Ava takes a long sip of her drink before leaning back in her chair.

Sara doesn’t respond for a moment. Instead she looks into the road behind Ava. She takes a slow sip of her drink and places the glass back down. “The last five years haven’t been that bad-”

“But if we stay here how will we make the same choices as before? Especially the hard choices? How will we let the people we lose go again?” Ava slumps in her seat a bit. “How will we not ruin the timeline?”

Sara sighs this time. “I don’t know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for the comments and kudos! I really do appreciate the feedback, so seriously. Thank you.
> 
> Nothing else to say right now, I suppose.
> 
> Hope you're doing well and staying safe!


	7. Fighting Fears

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Past Ava and Sara are great at yelling. Maybe, on reflection, Ava's a bit too good at throwing insults too.
> 
> Future Ava and Sara have a foolproof plan now. Okay, the plan is just to walk strategically. They can't screw that up, surely?

This isn’t going to work. Lance is standing at her chair, her hands flying through the air as she yells at Ava. The restaurant they’ve chosen is another with an outdoor seating area, close to the hotel. Everyone must eat outside all the time around here, Ava thinks to herself. She glances at the coasters, all of which are imprinted with the restaurant’s seal, an anchor being hugged by a mermaid. Ava smirks. This place doesn’t even serve seafood. She tunes back in to Sara, who is in the middle of calling Ava incompitent and impertinent. The combination of insults almost makes Ava laugh because they so closely resemble the feelings that Ava used to harbor for Lance. Ava needs to get in the game if they’re going to sell this. She stands up.

“Look, Sara.” She pushes her drink out of the way to plant her hands on the table, leaning forward. “You’re the one always getting in trouble at work. You can’t complete a simple assignment without devising some ham-fisted scheme that could, uh, get you fired as easily as it could succeed.”

Ava wants to smile. She wants to put less bite in the claim, to make it clear that she’s upping the game without being serious. But the people watching, those eyes that dart between the two women, keep Ava on course. For the first time they seem concerned.

“Ham-fisted?” Lance leans over the table too, knocking her own drink over. “Better than working with a tight fist. Gotta be in control, don’t you Sharpe? All the damn time?”

“I’m in a position of authority,” says Ava. “I respect my higher ups in a way you never could.” She breathes deep for a second before continuing. It’s all an act, she tells herself. They’re already louder than they were in the hotel room. “Not something you’d know anything about even though your dad was a cop.”

Sara’s mouth drops open for a second and Ava thinks maybe she went too far. Lance snorts. “How could I develop any respect for authority with you breathing down my neck all the time? You’re bossy and interfering at every turn.”

Ava remembers these claims from when she first met Lance. She recalls the judgement and disdain in the other woman’s eyes. It’s been turning into something else over the last few weeks, but Ava can’t think about that now. It’ll take the bite out of her fight. Ava needs to keep this going. “That’s because you can’t be trusted to do your job without me holding your hand,” she says. “You’re the same outside of work too. These last couple days you’ve been depending on me to guide us through, to make all the decisions and call all the shots.” It isn’t true, but this breakup has to feel real. This trip has built them into a formidable team, Ava thinks.

Lance steps away from the table, pushing back the few people who are standing too close. Ava notices with satisfaction that those people are buying it. Sara is looking at Ava with a challenge in her eyes and Ava’s never been one to back down. She steps around the table and follows Sara onto the cobblestones.

“You’ve never been a kind person,” says Lance. “Not to me, anyway. With your judgement and your, your conviction that I’m nothing more than a screw up.”

“A kind person?” Ava laughs. “That’s a joke, right?” She takes another step towards Lance and notices that Sara has turned her body in a fighting stance. A nice touch. Ava might as well lean in. “You don’t deserve kindness, you deserve pain.”

A second too late Ava notices that Sara has balled her hands. Ava barely raises her own open palms before Lance lashes out to hit Ava’s shoulder. Ava takes a step back, not from pain but surprise. She balances herself for a fight. Sara is serious, her eyes are narrowed and her breath is steady with determination. Ava recalls their fight on the Waverider, ready if Sara wants to go there.

“I deserve it?” Sara says, all showmanship gone.

Too late Ava thinks back to Lance’s file. The dead sister, the times she’s lost Legends on missions. The weight of that pain that Lance bears every day. Shit. “Sara-” Ava starts.

Lance steps forward and raises a hand to strike Ava again, but she easily deflects the blow. Ava knows the reformed assassin’s skills aren’t behind the throw. “Get out of here,” Sara says. She takes a step backwards before turning towards the hotel. “Stay somewhere else, Sharpe. We’re done.”

The dismissal is real. Ava knows it is, yet she can’t move from where she stands. They need to stay together, to work this out and get back home. They need to see if their breakup has changed this world. How can they do that if they’re apart?

Ava should call after Lance. She should grab her arm and spin her around. She should tell Lance she’s sorry, she didn’t mean to take it that far or make it that real. She should say so many things. Tell Sara that she deserves no pain, that none of this is her fault. She should pull her into a hug and let the regret show in her voice and in the intensity between them. Instead Ava watches Sara walk away. She watches until her coworker, her friend, her partner reaches the hotel.

Ava turns on her heel, heading anywhere but into the conversation that she needs to have.

Five Years Earlier:

Sara sits up a bit straighter in her chair. “I know what we should do.”

“Hmm?” Ava is nursing her second drink. She doesn’t know if Sara is referring to what they should eat for dinner or what they should do about this damnable position they’re in. Ava wants to eat now but her stomach is too unsteady. The alcohol isn’t helping.

“We should go back to the hotel.” Sara downs the last of her whiskey and rotates the glass in her hand. “Our past selves are bound to turn in for the night. Maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll already be there when we show up.”

Ava looks at her own glass. She feels anything but lucky at the moment. Their other selves have probably checked out and found a new place to stay. Probably in another city. Or they still have their future tech and they’ve boarded the Waverider. Maybe they like being in the future, knowing what will happen. Perhaps they’re intentionally avoiding this Ava and Sara because they know that they’ll have to switch back. Ava shrugs. Even though she feels miserable about this idea she has nothing better to offer. “Sure.”

Sara reaches half-way across the table as though wanting to take Ava’s hand. “What’s wrong?”

Ava scoffs. “We don’t really have a plan. We have no future tech, no way to contact the Legends. And we’ve been in this town all day. If our past selves wanted to find us surely they would have. Why didn’t they have breakfast when we did? We could have switched back hours ago.”

Sara laughs. “Ava, they don’t know what’s going on any more then we do. And if they’re really us from five years ago do you think they would have agreed on anything as quickly as we did this morning? Even whether to leave for breakfast?”

Ava recalls the passionate distaste she had for Sara, before the feeling in her gut morphed into respect and love. She chuckles in a defeated way. “No.”

With a smile Lance taps a finger on her glass. “And it’s not like we’ve been sitting still waiting for them to find us.”

Ava leans forward with a slight smile tugging on her lips. “They’ve probably been arguing all day.”

“Yup.” Sara reaches into her back pocket to grab her wallet. “Let’s get out of here, Sharpe. See if we can’t meet another version of ourselves.”

Ava thinks about the feel of Sara’s hand in her own on the walk back to the hotel. Sure, they’d separated during missions before, but this feels different somehow. She wants to reach over and touch Sara’s hair or slide a finger down her arm. Instead she tucks her hands into the pockets of her slacks.

“I wish we could hide a message.”

Ava turns to Sara’s voice and smiles. “For our other selves? How very Neil Gaiman.”

Sara shakes her head at the reference but doesn’t respond for a minute. Instead she stops and stares at the windows of an art gallery. “There’s art in the hotel room,” she says.

Ava turns to face the display too. “True,” she says. “But the day’s already mostly over. How do we know they haven’t looked there already? I wouldn’t double check the same spot.”

“You’re too efficient for that, Director Sharpe.” Sara grins. “No, a message isn’t right anyway. I think staying in the hotel room would be a better bet. We’re bound to come back.”

Ava reaches up to tuck a strand of loose hair behind her own ear. “Maybe.” She starts walking again, Sara coming alongside. Ava’s eyes glance over the businesses as they move. “It’s dinner time now,” she says.

“I’m hungry too,” says Sara.

“Wait.” Ava turns to Sara as they keep walking. “Maybe we can catch them at a cafe or a restaurant. If we stop at each one we pass we might get lucky.”

There is that word again, lucky. But this time Ava is the one who invokes it, she’s the one who is hopeful of a way out. Ava ignores the fact that Sara hasn’t given up in favor of feeling temporarily ahead. After all this time she still can’t fight the urge to hold these mini competitions in her head with Sara Lance.

The first restaurant is indoors. Ava and Sara enter with some hesitancy. Behind the host stand is a wall. There’s a hall to the side that leads, Ava assumes, to the dining room. Ava is racking her brain, trying to think of a way to get into the dining area, when Sara pouts at the host.

“Sir?” Sara tries to look around him and to the right, down the hall, even as she speaks to him.

“A table for two?” The host raises an eyebrow as though he doubts their hunger.

“No, we were here earlier,” Sara says. She brings her eyes back to the man and frowns. “I left my purse. Can we go check our table?”

The man squints a bit as she looks at him. “I can have a member of our wait staff check if you’ll just tell me-”

“No,” Sara says. She walks around him in one stride and glances back over her shoulder. “I’ll only be a minute.”

The man turns to follow Sara when Ava steps into his space for a moment, just long enough to get his attention. She smiles as he turns back to her. “She’ll really be just a minute,” she says. With a quick glance at the specials menu behind the host stand she smiles. “I had the braised lamb with grilled veggies and it was a delight.”

The host glances in the direction that Sara has gone and gives Ava a tight smile. “How very good for you.”

There’s a tense silence as both wait, and Ava wonders for a moment what will happen if Sara comes in contact with her other self. Sara would change back while Ava is in this vestibule, alone. Would Sara have some physical reaction to the switch? If she does surely there will be some panic, then will Ava have to follow the other Sara to a hospital. Finding the other Ava would be impossible at that point. She would be left here without her Sara, practically alone. Ava shakes her head as the host shifts on his feet.

“Will you stay here if I go stop her?” Although it’s a question his eyes are attempting to tell Ava to stay.

“No,” she says. “I want my friend to find her wallet.”

“I thought it was her purse?”

Ava smiles. “The most important part of any purse is the wallet,” she says. “IDs and such.”

“Right.” As the man shifts his weight again Sara comes around the corner, eyes wide as she meets Ava.

“It wasn’t there,” she says. She grabs Ava’s wrist and pulls her towards the door, glancing back at the host. “Should have known really. I probably left it at the bookstore.”

As they reach the door Ava sees two people round the corner from the dining room dressed in the black long sleeve button ups of the staff uniform. The host points to Sara and Ava and Ava wants to laugh. They’re the only patrons in the room. She turns back and pushes the door open so she and Lance can leave.

“That place was fancy!” Sara laughs as they make their way down the cobblestone street, ducking into a doorway to watch their pursuers stop on the sidewalk, assess, and turn back to the restaurant.

“Fancy and aggressive,” says Ava.

Sara shrugs. “They knew we were lying straight off. Your shirt is a dead giveaway.”

Looking down, Ava grins. “Right.”

“What’s the point of checking these restaurants?” Sara starts walking again and Ava joins her. “If we get separated-”

“I was thinking the same thing,” says Ava. “We should just go back to the hotel.”

“Right.” Sara glances over and they make eye contact for a second. "I hate waiting."

"I know." They walk for a few more minutes and Ava can’t stop glancing at every restaurant on the way. Although they’re probably right to go to the hotel Ava can’t help wondering if they’re walking past their past selves without realizing. The restaurant closest to the hotel has an illustrated anchor and mermaid on its sign, brightly colored and loud. Ava wonders, for a moment, if her past self would go to such a tacky place.

Inside the hotel Sara and Ava make a beeline for the elevators. When they enter their room they exhale. Ava locks the door, her smile impossible to hide at the thought of being alone with the Captain. She turns and holds out a hand to her love but pauses, seeing Sara’s eyes go wide and her face fall.

“Sara?”

Ava steps forward and grabs Sara’s arms, steadying her for a moment.

“Ava-” Sara cuts herself off and suddenly she’s not standing. Ava lurches forward to grab her waist as her knees buckle.

“Sara. Sara.” Ava bends down to the floor with Sara, cradling her head. Sara’s eyes are closed and her head wobbles on her neck as Ava lays her down. Ava puts a hand to her neck in an attempt to find her pulse. Nothing. “Sara!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again I thank you for the kind words and kudos! I hope you continue to like this story as it progresses. I finished writing it today, so perhaps I'll start drafting a new story over the next couple of days.
> 
> If you've read it and like it please do let me know. It feeds my self-isolated ego.
> 
> (Also I'm so sorry for doing all of that to both versions of Ava and Sara. But nothing can be simple, I suppose.)
> 
> Stay safe, friends!


	8. Ava(s) Alone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Past Ava knows she should apologize but she's not so sure about her, you know, ability to gain forgiveness.
> 
> Future Ava feels more alone than she has in a long time, even with some questions answered.

The sun is setting. Ava glares in the direction of the sun as it dips between towards the horizon, sometimes causing her to squint and at other points hiding behind the buildings to coat her in the cool blanket of a shadow. She shoves her hands in her pockets for a moment before taking them out again. Her mind fidgets too, moving from thoughts about the hit she blocked to remembering moments throughout the day. Lance’s hair over the edge of the bed as Ava lay on the floor, trying to hide. Lance insisting that they learn to fake being a couple. Calling intel gossip. Wrapping an arm around Ava’s waist when that barista hit on her. Telling Ava to call her Sara. Ava rubs a hand over her face as she picks up her pace. Just because Lance has some good ideas sometimes and isn’t as incompetent as she seems doesn’t mean-

Ava stops walking. She stares at the restaurant where they had lunch with Jared and Michael. The care Sara showed the boy plays through her mind, even as the Captain effectively worked to get information from him and his father. Ava rubs her hand over her eyes this time as she begins walking again. “No point,” she tells herself. Having a conversation with Lance would only lead to disaster now. Ava is too worked up, too frustrated by her own inability to communicate effectively. She needs a plan. She needs lines drawn in the sand and emotional distance claimed.

She needs to not hurt Sara again.

Ava tries to rehearse that conversation in her head. How could she explain to Lance that she cut so deep for the sake of their plan? That Ava thought the best way to sell the fight was to put some truth into it, the truth of how Ava used to feel? But Ava doesn’t feel that way anymore. She knows that Sara is capable and intelligent. She knows that her methods, though often unorthodox, are also effective. Lance should know how Ava feels, what Ava thinks. All day Ava’s been giving more and more to Sara’s way of doing things, which should have shown Lance that her words were false. Ava can’t imagine why Sara wouldn’t understand, until she can. Ava never told Sara any of these thoughts. Ava should have said something before she stormed off. Before she threw claims that Sara would have expected from Ava a month ago. Hell, before they staged the fight in the first place. Now all Ava can think about is that she is wrong.

I am wrong, Ava thinks. She sits down at a public bench and puts her head in her hands. “I am wrong,” she says. Not three words she is all that comfortable with. Ava wants to go back to the hotel to think but Lance will be there. Ava still holds frustration and anger tight to her chest. She needs to shake it. Wiping her face again, this time with her sleeve, Ava sits up. She pulls a small flip notebook from her pocket and removes the pen from the spirals. She always thinks better when she writes.

The pen will make a soft scratching noise when Ava begins writing. It’s soothing, that sound. Makes her think of other times she’s written through her problems. And her favorite method of study, copying lessons and definitions over. She squeezes the pen, then releases it. She just has to start. Ava balances the nib on the page, watching the ink pool a bit before lifting the pen. She tries again, thinking about Sara but not thinking about what to say. She remembers feeling Lance stand against her on the Waverider, strong and unafraid of Ava’s threat of arrest. Ava feels her heart rate increase as she remembers that fight. This isn’t calming her down. She closes her eyes and leans back on the bench, letting her head fall towards the sky. Think of nothing, she tells herself.

Ten minutes later the page is still blank. Ava is calmer, she thinks. She can have this conversation now. She can tell Sara that she is sorry, that she doesn’t deserve the pain she feels. Ava overstepped and is wrong. Sara deserves to feel joy and to know she’s capable. To feel love and to know that Ava has her back. Sara deserves all of this and more. Ava closes the notebook and her eyes, imagining the conversation again. She’ll tell Sara all of it.

Soon. First she wants to know if the fight worked. She can bring Sara research with her apology, give her words the weight of hard work and diligent study. Maybe, if Ava has something new to offer, Sara will forgive her. Ava stands up and decides to stop by the next restaurant or shop where someone seems to recognize her. Her stride is shorter this time, more determined. Focused, with the calm professionalism of a Time Agent. Ava feels better with a job to do.

Five Years Earlier: 

“Sara!” Ava is almost touching her forehead to Sara’s, her arms around the limp body. She feels the hot itch in her eyes that comes with tears and watches one fall onto Sara’s cheek.

Ava gasps and pulls back when Sara opens her eyes. She cries out as Sara speaks.

“You came back!” Sara doesn’t sound like someone who almost died. She sounds vibrant, relieved, and very much fine. Ava shudders and moves towards Sara, eyes on her lips, when Sara’s arms snake up around Ava’s neck and pull her into a fierce hug.

“I’m so sorry,” Sara says into Ava’s ear. She pulls Ava tighter with her apology. “It wasn’t a real fight but when you said that I deserved to be hurt-”

“What?” Ava runs her hands down Sara’s back, grateful to be touching her even if she’s not making any sense.

“I’m apologizing,” says Sara. “Not something you have much experience with, I know.” Sara pushes Ava away a bit and blinks. “Why am I on the floor?”

“You fainted,” says Ava. She reaches to wipe her own tears from Sara’s cheek. “I don’t know, you suddenly collapsed and you didn’t have a pulse and I thought I’d lost you or-”

“I fainted?” Sara frowns at Ava and shifts to get up. Ava has to move out of her way a bit, letting the Captain move on her own. Ava reaches for her hand once she stills, but Sara is looking around the hotel room, not at Ava.

“Whoa,” says Sara.

“What?” Ava grips Sara’s fingers. “Are you hurt?”

“No, we’re back!” Sara shakes away Ava’s hand as she turns in place. “Look!” She points to one of the two suitcases. “Our stuff is separate.”

“Yeah,” says Ava. “Like it has been all day.”

Sara finally looks to Ava again. Her mouth falls open and she stutters for a second. “No, no I mean, I mean our stuff is-” She cuts herself off with a shake of her head. The pause is full of anticipation and nerves even though Ava knows, on some level, what Sara is going to say. “You’re from the future, aren’t you?”

From the future? Ava glances around the room as Sara’s words bring what she already knows to light. “You aren’t.”

“No,” says Sara. She runs a hand through her hair. “You didn’t come back then.”

Ava is lost. “We both came back,” she says. “We walked through the door and you fainted- oh.” She makes eye contact with Sara. Not her Sara. “You had a fight. In your time. You came back to the hotel room and the other me, the Ava from the past, wasn’t with you.”

Sara shakes her head once. “No. I told her to go away.”

“Oh.” Ava gets to her feet and walks to the bed. “Well, that explains it.” Ava sits down.

“Explains what? How am I back and you’re, or rather she, isn’t?”

“We have to be in the same place as our other selves. You and my Sara, the Sara from your future, are both in this room. Or were. She might have left after you switched back, I don’t know. But I’m stuck.” Ava sighs. “Where is the other me?”

Sara sits next to Ava and Ava thinks, for a second, about taking her hand. But this isn’t her Sara.

“I don’t know,” says Sara. “We had this plan, this dumb ridiculous plan, and you, or rather she, took it too far and I got mad. I told her off and came back here.”

“She took it too far?” Ava thinks about all the times she and Sara have fought. They’ve gone days without speaking, have avoided one another before, and Ava knows she’s run away a time or two. But they’ve always come back.

Sara looks at the floor. “No. We had to sell the idea that we were fighting, so really she was doing what needed to be done. I was making it too light, too fake.”

“Why were you pretending to fight?”

“I don’t know,” Sara says. She leans forward and blows air out of her mouth, hard. “It was my idea. I thought that if we could have a fight then maybe something in the world would change. Or it’d draw out whatever anachronism is creating all this.” She gestures at the room as though that’s the only thing changed.

“It’s not an anachronism,” says Ava. She puts a hand up to her mouth. “I mean my Sara and I, we know what it is. And a fight, even one that was real, wouldn’t change anything.”

“But it has changed everything,” says Sara. She puts both hands on her knees. “We got in a real fight and she left. If we’d been thinking clearly we would have just stayed in this room. We would all be where we’re supposed to be.”

Ava doesn’t respond for a moment. She tries, briefly, to imagine where she’d go if she and her Sara got into a fight while visiting this city, but all of her choices are based on her knowledge of this place. The other Ava doesn’t have that. She speaks slowly. “So the other Ava could be-”

“I don’t know.” Sara rubs a hand over one of her knees. “Anywhere, I suppose.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now it gets odd. Well, odder. The pairs are split, their sense of togetherness suddenly broken. 'Cause how can you trust a different version of the person you love?
> 
> Thanks for reading and leaving kudos. Comment if you'd like - I know I'd love to read your thoughts.
> 
> Stay safe!


	9. Not My Sara(s)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Past Ava is given a way out of something that she's not actually in yet.
> 
> Future Ava isn't in love with Past Sara, and it shows.
> 
> (CW: In the first section Ava and someone else talk about abuse. It's not graphic.)

There’s no point in keeping her notes. Clearly Ava's been here before and nothing's changed. The server is friendly and polite and some people in the restaurant wave at Ava as she sits down. Some look at her with concern, and when she gets up to go to the bathroom a woman touches her arm and asks if she’s okay. A clear byproduct of the fight, but not a change to this time or the structure in which Ava and Sara have found themselves. Once back at the table Ava rips out the page of pointless, redundant notes.

“Ava.” Ava pretends for a second that it might be Sara. She turns to see the redhead from the cafe standing next to her, a soft smile on her face.

Ava tilts her head in greeting. “Hi, Sue.”

“Can I join you?” Sue gestures to the chair across from Ava.

This could be a good thing, thinks Ava. See if there’s any change in her behavior or memories of me. She nods to the chair and smiles.

“I saw you through the window,” says Sue. She turns to the cobblestone outside and runs a hand through her hair, her green eyes thoughtful. “Thought you might want a bit of company.”

“Thank you,” says Ava. She’ll let Sue take the lead on this conversation.

“I heard about what happened.” Sue looks at the tablecloth and fidgets with the rolled napkin and silverware for a moment. “Between you and Sara.”

“Yeah, well.” Ava takes a sip of her water, hoping that the barista will continue without too much prompting.

“Are you okay?”

Hmm. Ava watches Sue as she contemplates the question. Last night she would have been fine with Sara’s anger. She might have even though the Captain is being intentionally obtuse about Ava’s words, choosing to see them as hurtful. But after today? Ava doesn’t know what to think. She is upset that she hurt Sara and wants to make this right. The thought of Sara being alone, hurt and dejected, pulls at something in Ava. But Sue doesn’t need to know that. “I suppose,” says Ava. “We argue from time to time.”

“I heard that it was more than an argument,” says Sue. She isn’t watching Ava as she speaks.

“Oh?”

“I was there,” says Sue. Ava notices that Sue’s hand is a bit shaky as she brings it up to twirl her hair. Lance is right, Ava realizes. Five years is a long time to harbor a crush. Shit. “I was on my way home, I mean, and I heard her yelling.”

“Oh.” Ava takes another sip of water, trying to give herself some time. Sue followed her here, she knows. There’s no question in the redhead’s eyes, no denial. She probably watched Ava on the bench, perhaps debated approaching her then. Ava swallows more water then she wants before putting her glass down. This is a mistake. She can’t lead Sue on, not when Sara is- Ava stops that thought. Instead she presses her lips together. “I was yelling too,” she says.

“You were defending yourself.” Sue leans forward and puts her hand on the table, fingers braced. “She yelled first.”

“I don’t know,” Ava says. She sits back in her chair. “Sara wasn’t-”

“It wasn’t good,” says Sue. “And she hit you.”

Ava remembers the first time she fought Lance, on the Waverider. Today’s hits were nothing. There were no weapons involved and Sara hadn’t put anything behind either strike. Lance hit her harder that one time they trained together. “She didn’t hit me,” says Ava. “Not really.”

“I saw it,” says Sue. She leans across and touches Ava’s hand. Ava pulls back but Sue leaves her hand on the table. “I saw it. And don’t tell me that you deserved it.”

“That’s not what I meant,” says Ava. She slouches a bit in her chair. “We’re trained fighters. She didn’t put any of her strength into the hits.”

Sue pulls back her hand a bit, a look of confusion on her face. “Trained?”

“Yes. I learned to fight through work. So did Sara. We’ve trained together before.” We’ve fought before, she thinks. “Those hits were nothing. They barely expressed her anger and they didn’t hurt me.” They didn’t have to, thought Ava. They came from a place of pain, not anger, and each hit expressed that emotion quite well.

“If she’s trained she should have more control,” says Sue. She brings her hand back to her own side of the table and sits up a bit straighter.

“She does have control,” says Ava. “I didn’t have to take a step back from that shoulder strike.”

“You did,” says Sue.

“What?”

“You took a step back.” She shakes her head, clearly thinking that Ava can’t see the situation that is standing directly in her line of sight.

“That was from surprise,” says Ava.

“Doesn’t mean she was right to do it.”

Ava shakes her head. “That’s not what I’m saying. I wasn’t right to say what I said either.” She has to end this conversation. “Look, that fight wasn’t, it wasn’t real. It was all emotional anger but Sara would never really hurt me.” Not like I hurt her, she thinks.

“So you’re saying that because she could have hit you harder it’s fine?”

Ava looks at her hands. She knows that doesn’t make sense, that no violence in a relationship is acceptable. But she and Sara aren’t in a relationship and they’ve fought before, as Time Agent and rogue Captain. And she knows that if they were together Sara wouldn’t hurt her. And Ava would never talk to Sara that way again.

“I thought you knew better than that,” says Sue. She stands up. “Well, give me a call if you realize that you need some help.” She reaches for Ava’s notebook and pen, forgotten on the table, to scrawl her number. She pushes the notebook towards Ava as she stands.

“Thanks,” says Ava. Her gratitude feels empty even as she says the word. She watches Sue head for the door, then tracks her walking past the window.

Ava needs to get back to the hotel. She needs to talk with Sara, whether or not she has evidence that their experimental fight worked. She needs to know that Sara is okay. Because if they are stuck here forever at least they will be stuck together.

Before Ava stands up she looks out the window again. She is startled to see Sara outside, looking into each business on either side of the road as she moves over the cobblestones. Ava lurches forward and taps on the glass until Sara’s eyes meet her own.

“I’m sorry,” Ava says through the glass, willing Sara to read her lips.

But Sara doesn’t seem angry. She’s got a worried and all too tender expression on her face. Ava puts some cash on the table, stands up, and heads for the door.

Five Years Earlier:

Time is stuck in a forced sort of silence. Ava and Sara haven’t moved, haven’t spoken, since they realized that they didn’t know how to find the other Ava.

Sara breaks the moment with a look at Ava. She jumps off the bed as though expecting a shock. “You love me,” she says.

“No.” Ava tucks her hands under her thighs on the bed. “I don’t know you.”

“What do you mean you don’t know me? This is your past. I’ve been to your true time, I saw the champagne bottle and how everyone’s all gooey-eyed about your relationship.”

“But I don’t know this version of you,” says Ava. She’d thought about it in the moment after Sara admitted that she didn’t know where to find the other Ava. The Sara standing in front of her isn’t the Sara she loves. “All day Sara and I have had no idea where you and your Ava were going until you’d already gone. You’re not my Sara Lance.”

“That can’t be right,” says Sara. She begins pacing the room. “Your mind, your choices, are the same as my Ava’s. You must be able to predict where she is right now.”

“I-” Ava thinks about that logic. She knows where she would go because she’s been here before. This is a place she associates with the start of a new, life-changing love. She thinks of the people who live and work here as friends. She’s saved a life here and has spent hours wandering these streets and perusing these shops. When she thinks about an Ava who doesn’t know this place, who feels alone and angry, who isn’t in love with Sara, she is lost. “I don’t know,” says Ava. “I’ve never felt what she’s feeling while here. And I've never been here without my Sara.”

“Yes but you’re her,” Sara insists. She tilts her head at Ava. “You _are_ her.”

“No I’m not.” Ava reaches into her pocket and digs out her flip notebook. “Look.” She opens it to the page where she and Sara scrawled their thoughts earlier in the day. “Look at these notes. Neither of us knew what you were doing. We couldn’t predict or understand your actions.”

Sara takes the notebook and stares at the page. She touches the pen markings lightly. “I wrote this,” she says.

“No, you didn’t.” Ava wants to take the notebook back, to protect her Sara from this angry and frustrated version. She bites her lower lip as she watches Sara read. “My Sara did.”

“And not my Ava.” Sara nods, slightly. “I can tell. The handwriting’s a little different.”

She knows my handwriting, Ava realizes. She sighs. “Just read what it says. We had no idea where you were going or what you were doing in the past even though we knew you were us.”

“Oh?” Sara closes the notebook and hands it back. “What was your plan to track us down?”

After pocketing the notebook Ava looks at her hands. “We didn’t have one. We were trying to come up with something when, well, when my Sara fainted.”

“You didn’t have one.” Sara taps a finger on her leg as she looks at Ava. “But we have to get my version of Ava back.”

“I know,” says Ava. So that you can kiss her and become us. So I can get my Sara back.

The temptation to tell Sara about their future, about their shared joy and love, comes out of nowhere. Ava knows that it would be the worst sort of breach, the greatest betrayal to both their past and their future, but she wants to spill all. To tell Sara that it will be all right. That they’ll both fall faster and deeper than either thought possible. That they’ll train together and work together, that Ava will come to live on the Waverider and will become, willingly, a Legend. That Ava will never regret, not for one moment, her love for Sara’s future self.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew!
> 
> Here are some of my thoughts on the conversation between Ava and Sue. I'm trying to needle the arch of violent enemies to lovers. In the media I consume the fictional worlds in which such relationship exist are usually so violent that it seems natural for love to start there, but often that makes me a bit nervous.
> 
> In this story my writing is meant not to excuse abuse, but to show that crossing the line between violent passion and passion in love has the potential to be dangerous and unhealthy. (Sue is the lens through which we see that potential, but it won't become a reality in this story. Don't worry.)
> 
> I do love stories that stay on the right side of that line, like canon Avalance. I just wanted to interrogate that idea a bit.
> 
> Unrelated, today is the anniversary of my wife and I getting together! 10 years, friends. In celebration I am making pancakes and we're getting curbside from our favorite pizza place. Classy, no?
> 
> Anyway, leave comments if you'd like. Either way thank you for reading.
> 
> <3


	10. Who We Were and Who We Are

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Past Ava proves that she's very different but exactly the same as future Ava. Future Sara notices.
> 
> Future Ava argues with past Sara about who knows past Ava better, which is a bit weird.

“Ava” Sara is a few steps away in the dusky light when she calls out. She has a huge grin on her face which Ava can’t help returning for a moment before remembering her apology.

Ava stops and puts her hands behind her back, giving herself the formality and distance she requires. "Lance, I'm sorry." She watches Sara halt too.

“You’re sorry?”

“I know it’s not what you were expecting, probably.” Ava rubs her fingers together where Lance can’t see them. “I’m not normally one to apologize, but I was out of line.”

Sara steps close enough to touch Ava’s shoulder. “What are you talking about? Did you hit your head?”

“My head?” When Lance doesn’t explain what she means Ava takes a step back, dropping Sara's hand from her shoulder. “We don’t have to pretend anymore,” she says.

Lance seems confused. She steps closer to Ava again but doesn’t reach for her this time. “What?”

“We had our fake fight,” says Ava. She frowns at Sara’s confusion. “The reason I’m apologizing?” Sara appears physically fine, but Ava can't quite tell. “Did you hit your head?”

“Maybe,” mumbles Sara. She steps back from Ava. “You’re my Ava, right?”

Ava’s eyes widen. Sure, she’s thought about it, but Lance is untouchable. Aloof. Beyond Ava’s charms and certainly beyond protocol. Even though Ava might want that to change. If Sara wants it too though-

“No,” Ava says.

“You didn’t switch back?” Lance looks at the ground, something like panic flashing in her eyes.

“Switch?” Ava tilts her head. “Wait, are you-”

“I’m from this time,” says Sara. “And you’re not.”

“No,” says Ava. Sara has to be messing with her. “No, you’re not. You are from my time, we’re both trying to figure out how to get back.”

Sara grabs Ava’s wrist before Ava can think about running. Ava looks at the touch and knows that she needs to stay. “I’m not,” says Sara.

Ava feels herself dropping to the ground, her knees releasing as though the lower half of her body is being knocked unconscious. “No,” she says again. If that’s true, if Sara’s back and she’s still stuck, she might be stuck forever.

“We can get you back,” says Sara. She pulls Ava closer by her arm and drops her voice. “We have to switch you back.”

So you can have your lover, thinks Ava. She immediately blushes at the thought and tugs her wrist free of Sara’s grip to touch the cobblestones under her knees. Of course Sara wants the Ava who loves her, not this broken person who can’t stand against the fear she feels in her chest.

“It’s going to be okay,” says Sara. “We’ll get you switched and you can go see your Sara, you can apologize to her.”

And Ava, on top of the fear she’s already feeling, realizes that she might be stuck with this other Sara. She may never see her own snipping, insufferable version again. Instead she’ll have to live with, she'll be left with, the eager-to-please and overly concerned version standing before her. Ava coughs to hide the hitch in her breath before she drags herself to her feet.

“We can get you switched,” says Sara. She moves to take Ava’s hand but pauses. Ava thinks about her own Sara as she shifts to be out of future Lance’s reach.

“How?”

“Simple,” says Lance. Ava must think of her as Lance. She’s not Sara. “We get you and your other self in the same place at the same time.”

“Are you serious?” Ava’s lips quirk into a disbelieving grin, mocking. “We’ve been in this same damn city all day.”

“No, it’s gotta be the same space. Room. The city’s too large to allow the switch.”

Ava snorts at the convenience of that. Of course it is. “So where do we go?”

Sara shrugs. “I was in the hotel room when I switched. My Ava was there too, so that might be a good place to start.”

“Of course you were,” mumbles Ava. She almost reaches to take Sara’s hand before remembering that this isn’t Sara, it’s Lance. She shoves her hands into the pockets of her slacks instead. “Lead the way.”

The two women walk side-by-side and Ava can’t help noticing that Lance matches her pace without hesitation. She’d bet that the future Sara and Ava never had to practice walking hand-in-hand. For some reason the thought helps her breathe. As she moves she begins to wonder what her Sara is doing. Has she found the other Ava? Does she like the look in that Ava's eye?

Not my Sara, Ava tells herself. The Sara from my time.

“What did you and I fight about?”

The question surprises Ava. “Uh, it was a staged fight,” she says. She doesn’t want to get into it but she sees how curious Lance looks. “We thought we could change the timeline if we broke up, but I got mean. I made it too real.”

“How?”

Ava shrugs. “I wasn’t thinking about your, uh, past. I told her that she deserves the pain she feels.”

Lance lets out a low whistle. “What’d she do?”

She told me to leave, thinks Ava. She shrugs instead. “I was wrong,” she says. “I'm going to apologize.”

Lance chuckles. “In my memories, you know, you didn’t apologize to me on this trip.”

“Don’t tell me about my future,” says Ava. Would Lance, no matter what version she existed as, always break the rules?

Lance holds up her hands. “That’s all I’m saying, I promise. I just meant that it’s interesting that you’re so different from my Ava, even though you’re also the same.”

Ava shrugs again. It’s beginning to feel like her default motion with this version of Captain Lance. “Time is weird,” she says.

“Agreed.”

As Lance and Ava approach the hotel Ava glances over at this version of Sara Lance. The woman looks the same as the version Ava knows, but there’s that soft side that Ava doesn’t like. Not yet. Maybe she would in the future.

Ava could ask Sara. She could pull her aside and demand to know about what’s coming. What they need to fight, what battles they’ll win and which they’ll lose, even temporarily. If any of their people will get hurt. Ava could demand the truth and change the future if the switch back works. Instead she continues to walk next to Lance, demanding nothing but her time. At the door she lets Lance enter first, trudging through the lobby without looking at the employees of the hotel or the lingering patrons. The elevator ride is silent as Ava wonders who the Waverider and the Time Bureau will lose next. She stops at the door for a moment, wondering if her future self is inside.

Five Years Earlier:

“Come on.” Ava stands and starts for the door. If she’s in public, among a crowd of people who can overhear, she won’t tell Sara anything about the future. She’ll stick to the mission, to their shared goal, and they’ll find her other self.

“What? No.” Sara steps away from the door, a confused look on her face. “We need to talk. We need to plan.”

“That isn’t going to work,” says Ava. “If you really made the, uh, other me that angry, do you think I’ll just come back to this room?”

“No, I think we need to strategize-”

“We’ve been strategizing!” Ava brings a hand to her eyes, not wanting to look at this version of the person she loves. This Sara has her eyes, her smile, her concern, but not her love. She doesn’t know Ava.

“No, we haven’t.” Sara steps to Ava and touches her shoulder. “You’ve been strategizing with Sara from the future. I’ve been with my, uh, the other Ava all day. I know her. Maybe we can, I don’t know, work something out together that you missed.”

Ava scoffs. “That I missed? You barely know your Ava. You’ve gone on, what, one mission together?”

“I’ve known her for months and we spent all day together,” insists Sara. “Please, it’s worth a try.”

Ava looks at Sara. She still wants to tell her about her future. It would be so easy, a conversation that could guarantee that Sara kisses her Ava, if they ever see one another again. She could give Sara advice to help the Legends. Ava bites the inside of her cheek, hard. She has to avoid that conversation. She can. She shoves Sara’s hand from her shoulder and moves to sit on the chair by the desk. “Fine, Lance.” She watches Sara raise her eyebrows. “What do you know about the Ava Sharpe that’s screwing up our future?”

Sara sits down on the bed and brings a hand to her chin. “She’s not screwing it up,” she says. “Not intentionally. She’s careful and thoughtful and obsessed with protocol.”

Ava snorts. “I could have told you that.”

“But she’s also willing to break protocol if she thinks it’ll benefit the mission.”

“No.” Ava’s hands flex where they rest on the chair’s arms. “I wasn’t willing to break protocol until after this mission. Certainly I was flexible, like with the Vikings, but I was too reserved to break the rules. I had to see that a more relaxed approach could breed results before I changed.” And I had to love Sara, she thinks.

“You’re wrong,” says Sara. “She drank with me before we came up with the fight idea. And she agreed to do it in the first place.”

“Tell me about the fight,” says Ava.

“We thought that if we broke up, publicly, that the timeline might change. It might shift somehow, or give us some clue as to what was going on.” Sara pulls a hand through her hair. “We didn’t know that we’d switched with our older selves.”

“So you yelled at Ava? Came at her too hard?”

“No.” Sara looks at the floor, then at Ava. “We both yelled, sure, but she’s the one that pissed me off. She told me that, well, it doesn’t matter what she said. I tried to hit her and told her to leave.” Ava watches Sara’s face, eyes downcast and eyebrows crumpled. “She was hurt.”

“Oh.” Ava sighs.

“I don’t know where she’s going, but I have an idea of what she’ll do.” Sara shrugs at Ava’s questioning look. “I heard a lot of her ideas today.”

“So what would she do?”

“I think she’ll try to work out whether the timeline changed at all. If she decides to apologize-”

Ava cuts her off with a laugh. “The me of five years ago was always reticent to apologize, especially to Sara Lance.”

“I think she will though,” says Sara. “But before she apologizes she’ll want something else to show me. Some kind of proof that our fight worked, that it was worth it.”

Ava gives a half-smile. “I have always been one to over prepare.”

“You don’t say.”

“So the question is where will she look for proof? She’ll go where she’d already been, right? Try and notice differences?”

Ava shrugs. “Sounds probable Remember where you’ve spent the day?”

“Of course,” says Sara.

Ava stands up and walks to the door. Before unlocking it she glances at Sara, wondering for a second if her other self has found her Sara Lance. Ava slides the swinging door bar guard out of its closed position and is lowering her hand to the deadbolt when she feels it. A sort of pull on her mind, something whispering a truth that she doesn’t understand. Ava turns back to Sara, confused.

Sara takes a tentative step forward, towards Ava. “Sharpe, you look a little-”

Ava nods, but not at Sara. The whispers get louder, thoughts of what could be and what should be. She closes her eyes, just for a moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One chapter left!
> 
> Thank you for sticking with it. The last chapter comes out tomorrow. Please let me know what you think so far.
> 
> I enjoyed playing with what the two future characters expect of and think they know about their past selves. And writing their interpretations of the fight was fun too.
> 
> Anyway, thanks again!


	11. Waking Up, Revisited

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Past Ava wakes up.
> 
> Future Ava wakes up.
> 
> And the Saras are ready to help.

“Ava, you have to stand. You have to walk through that door and be who you’re meant to be.” The voice is low and cold, familiar. Ava wants to close her ears against it like she can close her eyes against the sun, but she knows it will penetrate anyway.

“You’re not meant to hide. Not designed that way.”

Designed? Ava realizes the voice is her own, speaking at a lower register than she normally does. She has no control over the words.

“Go through the door. Let her hold your face, let her steady you and feel you breathe.”

Breathe. Ava gasps once, twice. She feels her lungs fill for the first time since before the voice spoke, before the beginning of her own mind telling itself this truth.

Truth? I walked through the door already, Ava thinks.

“No,” the voice says. There’s a shift and Ava can feel something foreign in her mind providing the words, spoken directly into her mind. “You walked through a physical door. Now you must open the door of your own life. Allow yourself to not fear the future and start to trust.”

Ava wants to shake her head but she cannot. She doesn’t feel her neck and has no muscle control outside of her chest, rising and falling with each captured and released puff of air. She expresses herself by holding her breath, letting her chest shudder.

“Don’t fight me,” the voice says. It comes softer, drawing her in to listen. She wants it to shout, to break through and make her feel how fake it must be. Instead the calm, the quiet with which it speaks, seems all too real. “Can’t you see that your future is fine?”

Ava can move her face, frowning as her gasping mouth tries to work with her flaring nose. She realizes that she’s blinking at the same time that her vision comes back, filled with blonde hair and a concerned expression. Sara.

“Trust yourself, Ava.” The voice is fading and Ava knows that it’s the anachronism speaking directly to her.

Why are you talking to me? She can’t stop the question from coming.

“I am telling you that you will be fine,” the voice says. “Trust in yourself and love her.” The words lose her tone on the last word, becoming deeper and making her think of a cello. “Goodbye.”

Now Ava can hear more than her own thoughts. She gasps as the sound of her own heart reaches her ears, pounding as though she’d just been sparring. She is laying down, Sara is cradling her head. She gasps again as she hears Sara yell her name.

“Ava!” Sara voice is external to Ava. Real.

“Sara,” Ava says. She smiles as Sara bends down and folds herself over Ava’s body, hugging her head against Sara’s own.

“What the hell Ava!”

Ava can feel tears against her cheek and she knows that this Sara is her own. There is concern but it’s stripped of that something else the future Sara wore. Ava reaches up and wraps her arms around her Sara, pulling her tighter as she breathes in the hug. Ava isn’t ready to let go when Sara begins to pull back, one hand holding Ava’s head with fingers tugging on her hair, the other on Ava’s shoulder. Ava lets Sara pull back anyway and she stares at Sara with a relief and a hunger that she doesn’t expect. Ava runs her tongue through her dry mouth and watches a similar sense of relief paste itself to Sara’s features.

“Sara, I’m sorry-” Sara cuts her off as she moves forward to kiss Ava. Ava pulls back for a second in surprise, then comes forward to meet Sara’s lips again. She is overwhelmed by the fear and hope and joy she feels as she kisses Sara back.

Ava hopes that this is more than a heated moment of relief.

The press of Sara's lips against her own is focused and strong, and Ava opens her mouth to take in the shape of Sara's lips with her tongue. Sara opens her own mouth to deepen the kiss and Ava knows this is better than a conversation, that an apology and forgiveness is passing between them in this moment.

As the kiss continues Ava does not realize that the memories of her conversation during the switch are leaving her. Like the people in the coffee shop, once her future is cemented her mind is altered. The magical creature is unbothered by the fact that this kiss, this moment, their love, does not need help to exist. The reptile feeds off a feeling of triumph. Actual change, for better or worse, is unimportant..

After a few minutes Sara and Ava break apart, Ava laughing with the adrenaline of near death, some form of time travel, and the kiss. She thinks that conversation might be required after all, at least while her heart relearns its own beat. “I guess you forgive me?”

Sara laughs back. “Of course I forgive you, Sharpe. You don't take half measures, even in a fake fight.”

Ava smiles. “You’re my Sara.”

Lance pulls back a bit, but it’s not a real attempt to leave Ava’s embrace. “I don’t know about being ‘your’ anything,” she says with a smirk.

Ava looks down and grins. “You’re from my time,” whispers Ava.

“I’m from this time,” says Sara. She moves so Ava can see the room beyond with the separate suitcases and the beds that were slept on by individual bodies. Ava wonders, for a second, why roomservice never showed up, but she doesn’t actually care.

“Me too,” says Ava.

“I know.” Sara helps Ava to her feet and the two women stand for a moment, looking at one another without speaking. Ava holds out a hand and grins when Sara accepts it with a strong squeeze. A rough scratching sound breaks the moment and both women look to the wall, under the old window. The scratching noise increases for a moment and they watch a hamster-sized creature claw its way out of the wall. Ava, without thinking, jumps forward to wrap her hand over the being. It’s a kind of six-legged lizard with a pointed hooked tail, like a fishing lure. Ava holds the creature with one hand and passes the tail down flat with the other, hoping the tail isn’t as sharp as it looks.

Sara is still, helpfully, and staring.

“Lance!” Ava lifts the creature and holds it out towards Sara, who finally moves. She grabs the coffee pot from the bureau and opens the lid. Ava shoves the creature inside and Sara lets the top fall, then holds it in place.

“Our anachronism,” says Ava.

“I suppose.” Sara looks into the pot at the creature, which seems rather undisturbed by its capture. She holds the pot as Ava removes a belt from her suitcase, which she wraps around the pot to secure the lid. “What do we do now?”

Ava lifts her arm to show Lance the Time Courier, on her wrist where it belongs. “Let’s take it to the Time Bureau. Then I can drop you at the Waverider.”

Sara nods. “That works.”

Ava and Sara each move to their own suitcases, which they begin to pile full of their disheveled belongings. Ava stops after she picks up her closed bag, before programming the Time Courier with the Bureau's coordinates. “Hey Lance,” she says.

“Yeah Sharpe?” Sara is smiling as she looks at Ava, a challenge in her eye. Like she knows what Ava is thinking, daring her to say it.

“Want to take me to dinner tonight?”

Sara smiles and takes a step closer to Ava. She leans in and places a kiss against Ava’s cheek. “That sounds like the perfect first date.”

Five Years Earlier:

“The future of your past is set.”

Ava recognizes her own voice in her head, speaking in a higher tone than usual. She doesn’t understand why she would think that.

“You’re not thinking it,” the voice says, and Ava feels a shift. There’s a light, stringed quality to the voice now. “There is nothing more for you to know.” And as quickly as the voice came, Ava forgets its words. She is suddenly breathing, steady and hard, but not panicked. She can see Sara, feels the Captain’s hands on her chest. She coughs as Lance presses on her ribs, hard. Ava feels a pain below her sternum, pressing down into her stomach and throughout her chest. She coughs again as Sara pulls her hands back.

“You’re breathing!” Sara grabs Ava's shoulders and pulls her up into a hug.

“Were you doing CPR on me?” Ava gets out one note of a laugh before she coughs again, Sara clinging to her. Soreness spreads through Ava’s chest, down her ribs and into her back. Sara had obviously done more than the one compression.

“You-you weren’t breathing,” Sara says.

“Sorry,” Ava says. She reaches up to cup Sara’s face and she knows, somehow, that this is her Sara. Her Captain Lance. The love is in her face, mixed with concern and joy at Ava’s returned breath.

“You’re back,” whispers Sara. She doesn't wait for Ava to respond before she meets Ava for a kiss. Ava’s lips tingle at the contact and she thinks, for a moment, that she could pass out and wake up to Sara’s kisses for the rest of time.

Sara breaks the kiss before Ava hears it. A sort of sliding sound, accompanied by the soft click of nails. Ava turns to the wall and watches a six-legged lizard, cat-sized and without a tail, roll out of the wall under the window. The creature sits down, it’s four hind legs tucking underneath while the two front stay extended, when it sees the two women on the floor wrapped in one another’s embrace.

“Ava,” Sara says. She shifts to a squat and lurches tentatively towards the creature.

“Take me with you,” the lizard says. Ava shifts to a sitting position as she watches. The voice is high and-

“You sound like a violin,” says Sara. She is inches from the creature, her hands outstretched.

“I have enjoyed working on your relationship,” the creature says. “But more than that I have enjoyed the time spent with my paramour from another time.”

“Wait,” Ava says. She tilts her head as she notices the creature's apparent pregnancy. Perhaps these creatures require the shifting of minds through time to procreate. “Was your, ah, paramour in this room five years ago?”

The lizard does not respond, but instead gets up to reach Sara’s hands. It looks up expectantly.

Ava chuckles as Sara picks up the lizard. “Mona will love working that detail into a novel,” she says. She looks at her wrist and touches the Time Courier, back where it belongs.

Sara places the creature on the bed while they pack up their things. Ava comes back to Sara for another kiss while Sara is getting their toothbrushes from the bathroom, relieved beyond thought by the familiarity in her Sara's eyes.

Set to leave for the Waverider, Ava looks at the creature Sara’s holding. She frowns, realizing that the magical creature will be without its paramour if they keep it on the time ship.

“You won’t miss your paramour?” The question is out before Ava can debate the logic of allowing the two creatures to meet again.

“I know where they are,” replies the creature. Its tongue moves out and touches its cheek. “I always know, and will meet them again some day soon. They are my partner.”

Ava programs the Time Courier, then places a hand on Sara’s shoulder as the portal appears. Under her fingers she feels strength, security, and love. And she believes that no matter what they must face in the future, they will triumph together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end, friends!
> 
> This story been a nice distraction for me in this weird, weird time we find ourselves slogging through. If you'd like more let me know. I have a bit of an idea niggling at the back of my brain, so I might start working on that soon.
> 
> Thanks for reading, and for the kudos and comments! And if you're on the fence about commenting, please do. I'm curious to see what you all make of this story now that it's complete.
> 
> Stay safe and <3

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! If you like it please let me know.
> 
> I haven’t written fanfiction in about 15 years. What better time than during self-isolation to return to those things that so captivated us in our youth. (At least that’s what I’m telling myself.)
> 
> Also for some writing, politics (I'm on the left side of American politics), and LGBT+ stuff feel free to follow me on Twitter: @TheyAWriter
> 
> If you like unapologetic cat photos (and some other stuff too, but mainly the cat) you can follow me on instagram too: ejfay
> 
> Thank you!


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